


Focal point convergence

by Silential



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Amnesiac!Hux, F/M, Humiliation, M/M, So more like clan techie!hux/Rey, clan techie - Freeform, clan techie!Hux, mind wiped Hux, no knowledge of Dredd required, not really General Hux/Rey
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-10
Updated: 2017-02-04
Packaged: 2018-05-19 14:49:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 34,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5970937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silential/pseuds/Silential
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>His words were clipped, spoken through gritted teeth. “Do you know who this is?” </em>
</p><p>  <em>Rey looked down at the frightened expression of the man pinned under Finn. There was no spark of recognition in her brain. “No.” </em></p><p>  <em>“This is General Brendol Hux. If you want to know the face of the man that destroyed the New Republic, you’re looking at him.” </em></p><p> </p><p>There have been no reports of General Hux on any front for nearly two years. When boarding a death gang ship to obtain information, the Resistance recovers a man who Finn believes to be the General himself. With Kylo Ren known to be looking for him, the Resistance elects to keep their new prisoner on base. Only try as she might, Rey can't see the First Order leader in the shy, frightened computer technician with the cybernetic eyes she'd inadvertantly rescued. And that's a problem, she thinks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Borrowed roughly from the character of Clan Techie in Dredd, but no knowledge of the film is required for this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm somethingstately on Tumblr if you ever feel like talking about Clan Techie.

Rey couldn’t tear her eyes away from the window. 

The lieutenant had been grilling him for exactly one hundred and twenty-eight minutes, and she knew because she counted every single one of them. In all that time, he didn’t stray from his story, repeating the same details of being captured from his home over and over and supplying further plausible ones no matter how they attempted to trip him up. The only silences had been punctuated with sobs, a faint _‘Why don’t you fucking believe me?’_ or two coming through the tinny comm after a particular vicious – and, she regretted to acknowledge, physical – barrage of questioning. As far as she could discern, there weren’t any loopholes, any lies, though she strained valiantly to hear one. 

Standing to her right, a captain she had never caught the name of voiced her exact thought. He was gruff, but seemed just as uneasy as Rey herself felt. “There haven’t been any contradictions, General Organa.”

Finn, his shoulder brushing comfortably against her own, only crossed his arms and stood up a little straighter. He cast a side glance at the captain before turning back to Leia, countering, “Nor any details Hux couldn’t have just made up.” 

"We have no definitive proof that it _is_ actually him,” Leia rejoined, her expression flirting dangerously with a glower. “Nothing but your absolute certainty." 

"Mind my language, but you serve under someone for long enough, and you get to be pretty damn certain, General." 

The man in question stared sightlessly back at them from a computer screen, the image, outdated and hailing from just after his days at the restored Academy, nonetheless still informative. Rey raked across his features, meeting with close-cropped fiery hair, sharp cheekbones, and full lips drawn naturally into a grimace – disdain distilled into human form, with hard eyes the color of hyperdrive plasma. Searing them into memory, she strained to make the same connection Finn seemed to be between this paragon of aristocracy and the man behind the glass.

Quite honestly, she couldn’t.

His shoulder-length, unkempt hair was currently tangled in the lieutenant’s fist, a harsh swathe of red against the black standard issue glove. Throat completely exposed by the angle it forced his head, his Adam’s apple bobbed rapidly as he begged, words tumbling in a torrent from his mouth. They were ones they had heard before, and the story only changed in pitch not content as the lieutenant brutally tugged his hand downward and their prisoner’s flew upwards. Clutching at his scalp, explanations gave way to shrill screams filtering in through the comm.

A frown creasing her brow, Leia knocked once on the glass. 

The lieutenant released his hold immediately and the man slumped forward, face obscured by a curtain of dull, greasy strands. His shoulders shook silently for a moment before he raised his chin again, revealing the wan, haggard visage and dark, dark eyes she’d done nothing but scrutinize all night. There was none of the haughtiness or confidence seen in the Imperial holo, the sharp arrogance etched into the Order officer a far cry from the broken softness of the visage of their prisoner. His face was nothing if not wonderfully expressive, a canvas of pain and horror and confusion she struggled not to feel. 

She was snapped back to the present as Poe began to speak. 

For back-up or moral support, Rey couldn’t decide, but Finn had requested Poe be present for the interrogation. He cocked his head to the side as he appraised the sight through the glass, tone more halting than she was used to hearing from him. "I guess I could see the facial structure. And the hair is the right color, or at least it might be – the Techie hasn’t seen a ‘fresher in a while. Those eyes though…"

The captain coughed in agreement, adding, “Bloody disturbing is what they are."

Rey had to agree despite herself, the memory of them gazing into her own enough to send a shiver down her spine. 

The dark blue pools of the cybernetic implants were currently trained on the table, and from this distance the already thin whites were barely visible around the large irises. They would be whirring and clicking, she knew, changing depending on his focus distance and desired magnification. Though he’d kept his eyes closed or downcast for much of the interrogation, the Tech hardly blinked when he chose to open them fully. When she took the time to count, he blinked once for every four of hers. 

Poe drew closer to the window pane, leaning as close as the computer stand allowed. "What's that smudge above his eyebrow? Bruise?"

Leia didn’t take her eyes off the Tech. "Tattoo. Says 'MALE.' There’s apparently another on the back of his neck. Clan property designation, we think."

Rey hadn’t noticed either when still on the ship, but her attention had been understandably elsewhere.

“Oh.” A beat passed, and Poe put into words what Rey was sure many of them were thinking. "We don't have any prints or DNA scans of the General in the databases do we?"

"No." 

The captain, light blonde hair tinged with grey at the temples, was fidgeting with the end of his jacket and looked like he was going to be sick. "I just can't see it. I mean look at the guy. And that accent isn't from Arkhanis." 

Poe nodded, cupping his hands as if that would let him see further behind the glass. "Sounds like the Yavin system. And maybe a bit of a lisp." 

"What’s with you all? I’m telling you, cut that hair, it’d be him," Finn argued, the vague annoyance he’d projected ever since they found the man on the death gang ship slipping into the righteous anger she felt simmering beneath the surface. "Besides, how do we know he's not lying? This could all be well rehearsed." 

For the first time since the interrogation began, Rey couldn’t bite back her thoughts. "He's not." 

Memories of his terror ricocheted through her, the suffocating throttle around his throat as he’d hid in the wires of the server banks, obeyed their commands as he stared down the muzzle of Finn’s blaster. Rey didn’t like this either; she never saw the General while on Starkiller, but she'd heard enough since about his exploits. But if this wasn’t him? The shivering husk of a man they found in the communications bay wasn’t on the gang’s ship willingly, and she refused to punish him for being in a hell he didn’t belong. She certainly knew a lifetime’s worth about _that_. 

"He's Academy trained. They would have taught him interrogation techniques," Finn pointed out, oblivious to her thoughts.

Lifting a hand, she gestured towards the small table in the adjacent room. "Does that look like an Academy interrogation technique to you?" 

He was hunched over and rocking slightly, arms wrapped tightly around himself. Trembling, the only time his hands left the protective cocoon around his torso was to furiously rub and press against his eyes, leaving great streaks of fire marring the pale skin around them. His terrified stare locked onto the window, huge and mournful; even though she knew he couldn’t see her, Rey turned away, desperate to look anywhere else. 

Maybe she had no right to have been shocked, but a part of her still was when it was Poe who replied, "Who knows. They're slimy bastards. No offense, Finn." 

"None taken." 

A pause, and Poe observed thoughtfully, "He looks like he's trying hard not to cry." 

Finn chuckled darkly at that and a crooked smile twisted his lips, elbowing the pilot, "Yeah it does, doesn't it? You should have seen Hux bawling in the control room on the gang ship." 

Only the captain laughed at the comment, nervously and a moment too late, more filling the silence that followed than actually expressing amusement. As much as Rey normally found her humor aligning with Finn’s, she couldn’t find it in her to join in.

"Let me speak with him." 

Her words hung in mid-air, buffered by the silence suddenly gripping the room. Turning to the older woman, Rey added, "General Organa, can't you feel it? Do you think he's lying?"

Leia’s reply was quiet, measured like she’d been trying to prove it to herself for the past two hours. Rey believed she probably had. "No. But I hope he is." 

For the fifth time that night, Leia raised her fist and knocked on the glass. Two taps rather than one, and Rey watched with a growing sense of anxiety as the lieutenant gave one last push to his prisoner’s head before sweeping unceremoniously from the room. The Tech flinched as the door slammed, chest rising shakily as he gulped in air. 

Ignoring the icy burn of Finn’s glare on her back, Rey took a deep breath and headed in.

\-----

_Her footsteps were too loud, she thought. No matter how softly she stepped, her boots tapped a quick staccato against the panels of the metal floor, sound reverberating down the hallway and potentially into the ears of an adversary. It wasn’t a tactical handicap she could afford. From what little she had seen, and granted that had been quite enough, death gang members were not the type of bastards to withhold a blaster shot when they had the advantage._

_Behind her, Finn treaded a little more lightly. Rey didn’t need to turn around to know his blaster was at the ready, training protocols – both Order and Resistance – having already kicked in. She may have been in front but she was still following his lead, neither the desert nor the island having taught her how to board and neutralize an enemy ship._

_They had taken down three assailants already, two with a blaster shot to the abdomen and one run clean through with her saber. The bodies now littered a hallway several yards behind them._

_Breathing deeply through her nose, Rey gripped her saber tightly. Its otherworldly hum calmed her, like the steady drone of an engine. Her skills with blaster deflection hadn’t been a focal point of her training with Master Luke, and as such, left much to be desired. But as Finn had pointed out, at least partial protection was better than none at all._

_It was this that she reminded herself, taking a moment to stretch out the tendrils of her awareness into the metal around them._

_So far, still nothing. Only the hum of consoles and the hiss of coolant running through the –_

_A soft ping against her senses, a held breath. And then – a white-hot bolt of panic, searing into her stomach, and for a moment, Rey couldn’t tell if it was her own. It didn’t feel like the mantle of dread she’d worn since boarding the death gang ship though, it was too sharp, too choking._

_Raising her fist, Rey signaled for Finn to pause._

_There was a door on the left several paces ahead, console glowing faintly in the dim hallway. Turning her head slightly, Rey gestured to the door, silently indicating with her fingers how many people were inside. She watched as Finn nodded, chest rising rapidly with what was no doubt the twin of her own fear._

_They advanced quickly. Leaning against the wall on either side of the door, it took only seconds to operate the lock. The door panels retracted with a low hiss, and blissfully, blaster fire did not immediately begin to issue from within. After a moment, Finn jerked his head and swung around to face the interior, and Rey followed suit a second behind._

_It was like stepping into the Jakku sun after the cool shade of an Imperial wreck._

_The air was a physical wall of heat that had perspiration springing to her skin within seconds, heavy and oppressive. Hard to breathe, it stank of dust and sweat and chemical coolant, the two small fans positioned to either side of the large main monitor ill-equipped to handle the banks of servers that jutted out from both walls. A chair sat empty directly across from the door, flung to the side as if its owner had only just scrambled from it. Live camera footage of the hallway and door still played on the screen._

_Rey could feel him – now that she was closer, she could indeed say it was a_ him. _Somewhere in the mess of wires that was the server banks, he hid, terror gushing so heavily through his blood she was surprised she couldn’t hear the ragged gasping of his breath._

_She pointed towards the second of the server towers._

_“Armed?” Finn whispered._

_Rey frowned, shrugging guardedly before finally shaking her head. It was possible, but unlikely; no man who was armed was that helplessly terrified._

_Finn stepped carefully towards the servers, drawing close before diving half into the thicket of wires. The panic she felt in her stomach reaching a sickening crescendo, incoherent screams rang out and Finn reappeared, blaster forgotten in the effort of containing the much taller man in his grasp. Using a move she’d seen him practice often with Poe, he slammed the man against a server bank, one hand holding an arm behind his back and the other pressing his skull to the metal casing._

_The man, lank red hair shielding his visage from view, made no attempt to resist, shivering and gasping with what Rey quickly learned were sobs. “I’m not armed, I’m not one of them! Please, I can help, just,” and his voice broke with his pleading, “please_ don’t hurt me.” __

_With a click her saber beam terminated, and Rey cautiously came to stand in front of their prisoner. He was trembling, eyes closed tightly and breath forced out in shuddering gasps between clenched teeth. His stained yellow shirt imparted a sickly pallor to his skin only exacerbated by the poor illumination, torn collar doing little to hide the bouquet of bruises blooming like a garland around his neck._

_Those weren’t from Finn._

_“We won’t hurt you,” she quietly promised, despite the questioning glare from Finn, “if you help us.”_

_“Anything, just tell me, I’ll do whatever you want,” he babbled softly. His eyes, swollen and inflamed, slowly risked opening to meet her own._

_Rey breathed in sharply, grip unconsciously tightening upon her saber. The irises were preternaturally large, blotting out the sclera like a galactic void. More than that though, they were_ moving, _interlocking rings expanding the pupil wildly in response to the fear she felt to be stoppering his throat. If there was one thing she considered herself to be an expert in it was mechanics, and these were certainly mechanical._

_Shaking her head, Rey tried to gather her thoughts. A person’s cybernetics were their business, no matter how… striking._

_“We’re with the Resistance,” she explained, looking just over his shoulder and trying to hold her voice steady. “We were told information about Order embargo reroutes would be aboard this ship.”_

_His brows, as red as his hair she noted, shot to his hairline, head shaking vigorously against the server banks despite the pressure of Finn’s hand. “I don’t know anything about supply reroutes. Or the First Order. I just do what sir tells me to do.”_

_Finn rolled his eyes, pulling harder on the arm tightly grasped in one fist. “Really. You don’t know. You don’t know_ anything _.”_

_“No! I don’t know anything!” The man nearly shrieked, rising onto his toes as far as he could to escape the relentless twisting._

_“Then what_ can _you do for us, Techie?” Finn bit out._

_“Everything,” he gasped. “If you let me work, I can shut down parts of the ship and close the gang off in whatever sections you want.”_

_She and Finn shared a glance, and it seemed to last a lifetime. His distrust was palpable, so solid in the air she practically could have plucked it like a string, and without the perception afforded by the Force, it was entirely warranted. But in her mind’s eye a supernova of emotions blazed within the Techie, as Finn had named him, hot and jagged – and none of them duplicitous. Panic was definitely the overriding one, but if Rey probed deeper through the white-hot torrent, the faint fluttering of something like_ hope _beat against her fingertip._

_Taking hold of Finn’s shoulder, Rey squeezed it reassuringly. “Let’s do this.”_

_Rey stepped aside as Finn pushed the other man towards the main monitor, wincing as he stumbled and fell roughly into the chair. Wiping the sheen of sweat from her forehead with one sleeve, she took up position on his right, a little overwhelmed by the size of the screen. A few taps and the live camera feed of the hallway disappeared, replaced with multitudes of feeds and floor plans flashing quickly in succession. It blurred together into indecipherable mush at that speed, but when she glanced over at the face of the Tech, all knitted brows and pursed lips, Rey observed the rapid twitch of his eyes, the whirring of the pupil mechanism, and was frankly amazed._

_“You can read all that?”_

_Flinching visibly, he spared only a second to glance in her direction before returning to the safety of the ephemeral screen. His elbows drew tighter where they were bent against his sides and he murmured, “Yes. These… aren’t for show.”_

_Finn stood on his other side, blaster reclaimed from the server bank and pointed directly at the Tech’s head, though she felt it was probably unnecessary. The Tech was straining to ignore his presence, or more likely the barrel inches from his temple, but Rey could see the little flicks of his pupil that meant he couldn’t quite keep his attention off it. His hands, hovering over the keypad, shook like a cockpit bracing for re-entry._

_This level of precaution was hardly necessary; the Tech was unarmed and despite his height, certainly no match for either of them. Rey kept her voice low, but firm. “Finn, stop staring. And lower your blaster.”_

_“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” he replied, but complied anyway to the Tech’s clear relief, at least with the bit about his blaster if not the staring. “I feel like I’m forgetting something.”_

_“We’re on a death gang ship, what’s to like? Wait, there –“ Rey pointed to the feed currently displayed on the holoscreen, the unmistakable curved insignia of the Resistance emblazoned upon the jackets of the team slowly inching down the corridor. “Those are our people. We have one other team, as well.”_

_The Tech nodded, quickly inputting commands as other floor plans and console command overrides pinged the screen. Almost too fast for her to catch, she glimpsed various explosions of coolant and heavily armed men stymied by sealed blast doors. It would have been nice to have a rathtar on board, but he seemed to be doing well enough without one._

_“I’ll keep your people unbothered,” he explained. “I’m currently rerouting and sequestering all crew in Cargo Bay 5.”_

_Now that he wasn’t pleading, his voice was still higher-pitched than she would have expected, words rising a little and touched by a hint of a stutter. It wasn’t an accent she could place, but then again, her sample set to pick from was critically lacking._

_Pushing the thought from her mind, Rey reached for the comm attached to her belt. As soon as most of the gang personnel were neutralized, she’d relay information and wait for further orders. Rey had a feeling that even if the Tech didn’t directly know the information they sought, he could certainly help them find it. If she promised him asylum, blew carefully upon the spark of hope she could still sense inside his head, she would be willing to bet there wasn’t_ anything _he wouldn’t do for them._

_Her attention had been focused on the screen when a flurry of movement broke out in her peripheral vision._

_There was no time to react as Finn grabbed the Tech by his collar, knocking him out of the chair and onto the floor. He was on him in an instant, the other man struggling to curl protectively around his stomach, howling, “What did I do? I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”_

_Finn grabbed the front of the Tech’s stained shirt, hauling him half from the ground and growling in his face, “Now I know where I remember you from. What, did you muck something up and Supreme Leader no longer had use for you? Decided to hide, so the Resistance wouldn’t find you? Did you really think you could hide from us?”_

_Shouting, Rey tried to pull Finn off as he fumed, but his solid weight worked against her and she only managed to make him release the death grip he had on the Tech’s collar. He turned to look at her, and the grim line of his mouth was the most icy she had ever seen his rage._

_His words were clipped, spoken through gritted teeth. “Do you know who this is?”_

_Rey looked down at the frightened expression of the Tech. There was no spark of recognition in her brain. “No.”_

_“This is General Brendol Hux. If you want to know the face of the man that destroyed the New Republic, you’re looking at him.”_

_“_ What? _” The Tech squawked, and it came out more sound than human speech. “Please, I don’t know what you’re talking about –“_

_Finn snapped back to face the man he still had pinned, a finger pointing sharply into his chest, “Shut your mouth before I do it for you.”_

_The man obliged, chin wavering as his throat worked furiously to swallow what Rey knew to be the burn of unshed tears._

_If they had been anywhere else, Rey would have been laughing. Even now, her voice was barely under control, amusement and alarm tangling together until she didn’t know which was which. “Finn that’s ridiculous. Are we even looking at the same guy right now? Look at_ where we are _. And why would the General have_ those? _”_

_She waved haphazardly to her eyes, watching as the Tech squeezed his shut._

_“I don’t know the whole story, but I served under him for years, Rey,” Finn said, calm tone belied by the grip he’d again taken up on the Tech, forcing his weight into the floor, “I can’t forget his face even though I try.”_

_The Tech only quaked, shaking his head as tears leaked out of tightly closed eyes._

_Expelling a breath, Rey gripped the comm in her fist, bringing it to her mouth and establishing a connection. “Rey to Control. You are never going to believe this.”_

_\-----_

Rey forced a grin to stretch across her lips as her hand pulled back the chair to the direct left of his own, metal scraping against the floor and causing him to wince. Contrary to the bright sparks of fear the lieutenant had inspired, his terror had cooled to a low-grade dread with her entrance, and Rey guessed that that was about as comfortable as he was going to get. 

Slight relaxation notwithstanding, he didn’t return the smile. Instead he tucked his chin a little closer to his chest and drew his shoulders forward, sinking into the space he occupied and endeavoring to make it even smaller. Not that that would be too difficult, Rey appraised; the long shirt and dark trousers he wore did nothing to disguise his slim frame. 

Settling carefully into the hard embrace of the chair, she placed her hands on the table where he could see them. If she had her way, she wouldn’t be moving them. "I'm Rey." 

No reply came, nothing aloud anyway. His throat moved as he swallowed, gaze glued to the table. In profile, his features were delicate, the curves of his jaw and lip accentuated by the tight clench of his teeth. 

Unsure what exactly she should be doing, despite her bravado in the observation room, she tried, "What's your name?" 

He turned slightly towards her at that, features softening as he murmured, "Thomas. I told you." 

Indeed, he had, many times, and often with the weight of the lieutenant bearing down on one body part or another. Shoving the thought from her mind, Rey fumbled with what to say next, managing, “You met me before. On the ship.” 

It sounded asinine the moment she said it, and she longed to take it back. 

Still, the Tech – _Thomas, Thomas_ – didn’t mock her statement, only acknowledged flatly, “I know.” 

“Then you also know I want to help you.” 

Once again no words met hers. He only sat there, teeth worrying his bottom lip as his uncertainty bled through the air to buffet her senses. 

Choosing her words carefully, Rey explained, "Thomas, I’m not necessarily convinced either way, but the people I work with think you're First Order General Hux." 

Like a latch holding him in place had been released, he leaned towards her, hands rising in front of him in supplication as the confusion in his eyes, and his words, pleaded with her. "Why do you people keep calling me that? I don't even know who that _is_. I already told you, the death gang took me from my home two years ago. I've been stuck on that ship ever since until you, you..." 

As if suddenly aware of himself, he trailed off and pulled back, hands falling into his lap as the limp tendrils of his hair screened his eyes from view. She had to strain to hear him. "... You rescued me." 

It was her turn to be at a loss for words, struck dumb for a moment by the honest clarity stretching between them. He believed it, believed that she rescued him – truly and sincerely. Rey watched as he slowly pushed the hair out of his eyes, the tattoo, just over his left brow, coming into view. Crooked and small, written diagonally in blue ink. 

_MALE._

Tearing her focus from the little word that said so much, Rey kept her voice even, "You were abducted from your home almost two years ago. _Brendol Hux_ went missing from our reports almost two years ago. We don't know why, or where he went. But we do know that Hux is a clever, well-trained, _dangerous_ man." 

Half-glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, the Tech laughed bitterly, and it was the first time she'd heard him do anything of the sort. It came out as a precursor to a sob, hollow and empty. "Then you definitely have the wrong fucking guy." 

"You know,” she began slowly, not wanting to frighten him into resisting her, “there's one thing I can do to prove that." 

“And what’s that?” He whispered, resignation to what might come etched into the lines around his mouth.

"I am trained in using the Force. And with it, I can see into your mind.” Rey swallowed, telling herself that she was better than Kylo, better than the Order. She would do this properly, and without egregious use of violence. With the tables flipped, she would be better than them. “You can let me do this, and we will have answers to all of our questions, or you can refuse, and I leave here right now.” 

She let the first part sink in, before continuing, “But I can't promise what General Organa will do. She might just come in here and take a look for herself anyway." 

It was not exactly a bluff; Rey honestly didn't know what the General would do in the case of his refusal to cooperate, but she was afraid it might be something much worse. In any case, she prayed it wouldn’t come to that – she had felt his acquiescence on the ship, and with any luck, it still held firm. 

He was silent at first, head tilted away, but after a long moment his jaw clenched and he nodded his assent. His shoulders sagging, he couldn't seem to bring himself to look her in the eyes. "Will this hurt too?" 

She winced, not missing the final word and thinking of her own experience for a second before the memory was banished once more. Reaching out, Rey paused just before her fingertips brushed against his pale cheek. "No. Just don't fight me, and it won't hurt, I promise." 

It required nothing to span the hair’s breadth that separated them, the palm of her hand cool against the surprising heat of his cheek. She allowed herself one moment, one breath, detachedly noting how soft his skin had no right to be, before pushing her awareness until it overlapped with his own. 

Once in his head, Rey kept her touch as gentle as possible, folding herself inward to brush up against only what she intended to. It was a turbulent enough place without her screwing it up further, as most untrained minds were, though she had to concede his was clearer than most. Kylo Ren had smashed the searching coils of his essence into every cranny, tearing viciously through anything that stood in his way and swallowing en masse her every thought, every feeling until she’d reversed the polarity of the situation. Rey now behaved quite the opposite, extending careful tendrils into his memories, appreciative of the fact that despite the reflex to do so, and the far away shivering of his body under her touch, he kept from repelling her. 

It was startlingly intimate, being in someone’s mind when they didn’t claw or hold anything back. Unsettling and warm, and not wholly unpleasant. Wanting it to end for a variety of reasons, one of which being that she didn’t – as efficiently as possible, she began to work her way backward. 

_Rey, statuesque and god-like, standing next to him and staring at the screen with wonder. The ethereal glow of her saber upon her face in the dark of the control room, the light like starbursts in the center of her eyes._

_The harsh slam of his back against the passageway, the cruel laugh as he scrabbles at the hands closing over his throat._

_The press of a knife into his stomach, the lies rolling off his tongue as he convinces the floating hangar that they mean the station no harm. Before that it was the end of a blaster to his head, the arm around his throat, the threat of an airlock._

_Pangs of hunger splitting him open, closing his eyes as the leather of a boot meets his lips and yet still the contents of the bowl slop onto the floor._

There were more of these, and Rey skipped eagerly by with only a cursory glance, unwilling to dredge up pain for the sake of it. Pressed so close to one another, their minds twanged together, and the mention of pain in her own ruminations reflexively summoned one of his own to the surface. Unsure if it would prove useful, she couldn’t help but seize it and slip into the memory. 

The moment she did, Rey wished she hadn’t. 

The term _blinding pain_ was not one she had ever truly examined. But as limbs that are not hers struggle against the restraints surrounding them and harsh screams that do not come from her throat shred her ears, the term is the only thought she can grasp as her head is stilled and two thumbs are pushed unceremoniously into the sockets that up until a moment ago were her eyes her eyes her eyes her eyes – 

Rey launched out of the memory, almost breaking contact entirely with the force of her ejection. Distantly she felt the sour burn of bile in her throat, the need to swallow before she retched the meager contents of her stomach. Pausing for a moment, she recalculated her bearings, wishing she could stop the screams in her head. 

But still, needs must, and Rey turned her awareness back to the mind under her fingertips. Her search was even more perfunctory than before, until at last she found it, the faint haziness that came from false memories. It was one she recognized from her own mind, the characteristic glow that lingered after whoever wiped hers. 

As softly as she tried to enter, Rey retreated. 

The snap back to her own body was unnerving at best, a few moments shy of heaving at worst. Her gut churned and the feeling was only exacerbated by the way he shook, tears trailing down his cheeks as he wept quietly into a clenched fist. Her fingertips and palm were wet with them. 

Eyes wide and expression so very open, he choked out, "You saw all that?" 

"Yes. Thank you." She shakily ground out before pushing back from the table, thanking the stars she could still stand. For how much longer, she didn’t know. “I think we have all the answers we need now.” 

Unable to process what she’d seen, much less the internal vortices of shame, rage, mourning, hatred, hope – not all of them hers, but which ones she couldn’t tell – she selfishly slammed down the barriers around her mind, blocking out the open wound that was currently his. Heading for the door, Rey tried to forget his shrieks, the sensation of fingers pressing into her eyes. 

Well, she figured, that was a nightmare to join the others. 

“Rey.” 

Stilled by her name, Rey stopped at the door, not knowing how to explain. Would she wish that on an enemy? She didn't know. And maybe that was bad enough. 

“Don’t go,” he begged. 

“I’m sorry.” It hardly seemed enough, and at the same time, too much. 

Without turning around, Rey let herself back outside, into the observation room. Four pairs of eyes honed in on her entrance, a thousand questions in each. 

She worked her mouth, but nothing seemed to fit, and it was with a jolt she realized her hand was still wet. Clearing her throat, she wiped her fingertips against her trouser leg. 

"He's not lying. But if that was General Hux, he isn't any more." 

\--- 

Hours later, as Rey tossed sleeplessly in her bunk, a lone comm in a quiet corner of central command relayed that exact message to a coded uplink on the Finalizer. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey desperately tries to see the General, but she can't. 
> 
> And, we see a little Kylo here. (As well as a good deal of poor Hux.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so, so much to everyone who is reading this! Just as a note, you can also google Clan Techie and you'll see who I am pulling from.
> 
> Next chapter is more Rey/Hux direct interaction and development, as well as Kylo/Hux.
> 
> I'm somethingstately on Tumblr - come say hi or to talk about Kylux!

From the fenced off corner of central command that Leia deemed her office, Rey could still hear the hustle and bustle of the Resistance tacticians in the background. She hung back against one of the partitions, as much to prop her exhausted body up as remain out of the way of the small crowd filling a space never meant for it.

Leia’s attention didn’t stray from her datapad, tapping and scrolling through the morning’s updates. Ship maneuvers in the system, break-downs of supply usage and refueling schedules, the typical lot; Rey had seen her perform the same ritual each morning since she’d returned from training. Leia had even once insisted on walking her through it, and the experience was enough to convince Rey of the blessings of not holding command.

It may have slipped another’s notice, but Rey didn’t miss the slight disarray of her hair, normally immaculate braids fraying from where they were twisted against her head. Perhaps the only indication their current problem had weighed long on her as well, Leia’s words were clipped. “Eventful night?”

The night shift officer that had manned the holo feed of their prisoner’s room only shook his head. “Nothing to report, General.”

Well, at least it seemed the evening’s events hadn’t scarred him too badly. 

Rey swallowed what might have been a laugh, and desperately wished she could have said the same. Frankly, she’d had a terrible night, and Rey had hitherto considered herself a connoisseur of terrible nights. After the way her mental probing had stirred _that_ kettle of sand vipers, it didn’t require the Force to know she’d relived an old demon from his head. 

Many old demons, in fact – more than she’d ever wanted to see. 

Never one for sighing, it surprised Rey to hear one slide from Leia. Setting the datapad aside on her desk, deceptively bare for all the business she managed, she rubbed at her temples with the familiar motion of someone carrying too much. As always, she wasted no time in cutting to the heart of the matter. “We have a wampa by the ears, people. We can’t hold on and we can’t let go.” 

“Are we bringing him up on war crimes?” Finn asked, standing a few paces in front of her. 

Finn hadn’t said a word to her all morning, but to be fair, she hadn’t tried to initiate conversation either. Now she eyed the hard lines of his back, wondering if he’d slept as poorly as she; with weariness etched into every word, he certainly sounded like it. 

“Normally that’s something I would leave to the Senate to decide. So in light of certain ironies,” Leia said and pushed back from her desk, “patience seems to be the wisest course.” 

She sounded a lot like Luke, Rey thought, and had to swallow the burst of irritation that followed. Leia’s actions at least were guided by rationality, not apathy or resentment. 

Leia turned her back to them, hands clasped at her waist with a tightness that belied her projected air of serenity. In times such as these, Rey most easily recognized the stateswoman the general had been for most of her life, steeped in diplomacy and the hot waters of pragmatism. The suppression of one’s personal wants in favor of what was best was a difficult route to take, and Rey admired the deft skill the older woman revealed in walking the knife-edge. 

Her face still hidden from view, Leia’s head tilted slightly in her direction. “He completely believes he is who he thinks he is?”

“Yes, of course,” Rey answered, fumbling for the right words to express the truth, “But General he doesn’t just believe it – he _is_ that man. The memories may be false but they’re the only ones he has.” 

“I see.” 

Though no one spoke for a long moment, it was far from silent; the air hummed with the multitude of unshared thoughts. 

When she finally did continue, steel girded her words, rigid and unarguable. “I’ve given this a good deal of thought – more than some of you realize. And it seems the only justifiable action is to keep him here indefinitely.” 

Finn coughed, no doubt to resist saying more, and Leia finally turned to face them all, leaning over her desk. “I don’t like it either, Finn. But I can’t bring myself to field execute a man under these circumstances. Justice mandates a trial, and right now the interim Senate isn’t equipped to handle a conviction this delicate.”

“More importantly,” her eyes slid to Rey, sharp and unreadable, “there is no man to convict.”

Releasing her gaze, Leia signaled to the aide-de-camp waiting patiently by the door and snatched her datapad from the desktop. Her fingers flew to input commands. “Inform Captain Starmer he is regrettably relocated from his private quarters to general barracks, effective immediately. And if he has a problem with it, he can submit it in writing. Have him remove his personal items and ready the room for our new… guest.” 

After a moment, Leia handed over the list of orders, adding, “I want all outside comm access completely shut down in that room, as well as full control overrides in place for the door. He is not to go anywhere unaccompanied or be left alone except when locked in his quarters. Understand?” 

Those present issued various grunts and nods of comprehension, ranging from grudging to largely indifferent. Rey kept silent, knowing full well her thoughts on the matter did not seem to align with public opinion. 

“Good. You are all dismissed.”

Rey pushed herself off the partition, intending to shuffle out and head to the mess hall. Her stomach hadn’t quite been up to the challenge of keeping down food when she’d tried earlier, as she’d discovered when the aroma of Corellian blood sausage had called to mind the iron tang of – well, perhaps the second try would prove more successful. 

It seemed that Leia had other plans for her, however.

“Not so fast, Rey.”

She stopped at the door, already having an inkling of what was going to be asked of her, if not quite the specifics. “Yes, General?”

“Fetch him from the holding room and escort him to med bay. Those eyes need to be looked at.”

\-----

The crude holding chamber they had left him in for the rest of the night was better than the interrogation room, Rey knew, but not by much. It was a glorified storage closet really, complete with shelves of spare parts and random bits, though carefully cleaned of anything that might prove too convenient a weapon. Leia had at least ordered a cot to be dragged in from the barracks and something resembling a simple meal to be supplied. 

When she unlocked the supply closet door, she didn’t exactly know what to expect would be waiting for her behind it. It certainly wasn’t the neatly made cot, starched sheets that always made her skin itch tucked under the thin mattress. Nor the pale man sitting on the edge of it, focus absorbed by something small and shiny being twisted between deft fingertips. Picked clean, the meal tray sat on the floor. 

His attention hadn’t wavered at her arrival. In profile, she could see the way he bit his tongue between his teeth, eyes squinting to better see whatever was demanding his concentration. Features smooth, free of worry and strain, he looked so… _innocent_. 

Rey tried to expel the thought from her head. _Mind wiped he may be, but at the end of the day, this is Hux_ , she told herself, praying it would entrench itself in a mind determined to be lenient. _Be nice but don’t lose sight of that_. Resolve affirmed as best as could be hoped for, Rey lifted her fist. Courtesy was neither one of her specialties nor something she placed much stock in, raised as she had been, but Rey attempted nonetheless. A quick knock on the door frame would suffice. 

At the sound he snapped from his work and immediately gaped at her, blinking owlishly. 

“Rey, hi – oh.” A moment was all it took for reality to reassert itself, however, and his face fell, the smoothness crumpling into lines of apprehension. “More questions?”

“No, we believe you. In fact, you’re to be our guest – new quarters and everything.” _Not that most people are happy about it_ , Rey added mentally. 

Not privy to her thoughts, the tightness in his features relaxed by inches into something almost grateful, and Rey tried to remember her earlier mantra as a piteous burst of hope unfurled in his chest. Delicate and warm, it suffused into his thoughts, and Rey saw herself once more, warmed in the chill of the desert night by the fire of a similar dream. 

A hesitant tendril reached out, as if to curl around her. 

She mentally thrust it aside. 

Seeming to remember himself, he proffered the source of his diversion towards her in one open palm; a short stretch of copper wire, half of it twisted into various shapes and a dead ringer for the shade of his hair. “It’s nothing, I promise. I found it on a shelf.” 

“That’s fine, I’m not going to take it from you,” Rey replied uneasily, figuring that the death gang, and more than a few members of the Resistance, were people who probably would for the fun of it. “While we prepare the room, the General wants you to see our doctor.”

 _About your eyes_ hung unspoken in the air between them. 

Hearing her meaning anyway, he nodded somberly, rising from his perch on the edge of the cot. Too large for the slight frame beneath it, his shirt hung awkwardly from his shoulders, and she watched as his hand briefly stole beneath it to pocket his little trinket. He shifted from foot to foot, and it took her a second to realize it was because he was waiting for her lead. 

“Right. Follow me.” 

Excluding the barracks, the compound the Resistance had moved to after the discovery of the D’Qar base covered far less area than she might have expected. It reminded her of an anthill, if anything, all twisting tunnels and hollowed out chambers that never seemed to be quite big enough. Normally the walk to med bay would have taken only minutes, but Rey had no intention of parading him through central command. Word hadn’t spread yet, but it was only a matter of time and there was no need to hasten it along. 

So she took him the scenic route, a little less heavy in foot traffic than the main hallways. He held himself awkwardly when he walked, one arm bent against his body and the other hanging limply, not swinging with the natural rhythm they were designed for. When pilots and officers passed them by, accustomed to the close proximity and accidental shoulder checks forced by the narrow compound corridors, he hugged the wall with almost exaggerated care. It garnered more than a few odd looks thrown in their direction, which Rey promptly ignored. 

His legs were longer than hers, but she appreciated how he kept his steps small so as to not outpace her. Every so often he would draw closer to her, seemingly unthinkingly, before realization had him almost tripping in an effort to pull away. 

_To him, I’m probably the least frightening thing here,_ Rey thought. She supposed it was a compliment, if not exactly one befitting a Jedi in training. 

Sneaking a peek in his direction, Rey didn’t miss the way his hair, while normally disheveled, was even more tousled than when she’d probed his mind the previous evening. Tossing and turning would do that. “How did you sleep?”

He started a bit at the question, clearly not expecting it, and scarcely missed colliding with an incoming pilot in his distraction. Maybe a better question would have been _did you sleep_ , as suggested by the mental flickers of night terrors still fresh in his mind. They echoed the ones that had driven her to the ‘fresher, panting and shaking, needing to check that _they_ were still there. She wondered who dreamed first, and if he had stared at the low ceiling thinking about her as she had him. 

“Fine. I slept fine,” he stuttered. Worry cracked through though as he asked, “And you?”

Drawing abreast of the door to the medical bay, Rey stopped short and waited as he took a few more steps before sheepishly course correcting. A wan smile tinging her lips, she said, “Also fine.”

The door opened with a couple taps to the lighted wall panel, metal sliding past to reveal the cramped quarters of the med area inside. An examination table rested against one wall, several Bacta tanks directly across from it, with racks piled high with canisters and bottles lining every available inch not taken up by something else. It was far less tidy than the bay on D’Qar, though Major Kalonia had clearly done her best to exert some sense of order in the confined space. 

The woman herself stood up from a wireframe chair as they entered, warm smile at the ready, and beckoned them inside. A low whine implied the door had shut behind them. “Leia said you would be coming by, Rey. And this must be Thomas?”

She wasn’t exactly sure what Kalonia had been told, but her grin, directed to the timid man at her right, seemed to imply it thankfully hadn’t been much. He hesitated and flashed her a nervous glance, but Rey only angled her head towards the other woman.

“Yes, that’s right,” Hux answered, and Rey could only sigh. 

“Hop on up and we can get started.” Absently patting the examination table, Kalonia rooted through the drawers below it for the tools of her trade. Rey had seen the use of most of them during her time with the Resistance – often on herself, and often not very pleasantly. 

He gracelessly climbed to sit on the table, all gangling arms and legs that seemed to take up more space than he wanted them to. His feet hooked together, ankle to ankle, and he folded his hands quietly in the safety of his lap. Feeling a bit foolish just standing by the door, she padded closer to stand at his side. Although she tried not to dwell on it, he followed her from beneath his lowered lashes. 

Kalonia looked up at her movement, head tilting in confusion. “You don’t have to stay if you have something to do. We’ll be just fine here.” 

Knowing she wasn’t supposed to leave his side until she delivered him to the care of his new warden, Rey adopted a smile she hoped was convincing. The Major was kind to think of her, but it wasn’t an option she could, or wanted, to take. “No, that’s okay. I don’t want to leave him alone.”

“Alright then.” Kalonia shrugged, picking up something Rey remembered to be a glorified flashlight. Taking a moment to tuck an errant lock of dark hair behind her ear, she announced, “So, let’s take a look.” 

Expecting the change, Rey nonetheless watched it happen in real time. 

The warmth pervading the Major’s face dimmed as she finally took a good look at her patient, dismay taking root and blooming steadily into horror as the seconds ticked by. Rey noted the quick flick of her gaze to the tattoo above his brow and the bruises circling his neck, the concerted effort not to gape visible on her face. Trying, and failing, to school her features into something approaching professionalism, Kalonia switched on the light and raised her hand.

Hux stiffened as the probe neared his face, thin beam of light reflecting eerily from the irises. Far from the black she’d originally thought, Rey discovered they were surprisingly the deepest of blue. He squinted from the assault and attempted to turn his face away, but Kalonia’s steady hand on his jaw stopped him short. Far from comforting, the touch sent his breath racing. 

“Where’d you get this mess done?” Kalonia breathed, clearly oblivious in her disturbed curiosity to his distress. Rotating the probe, she watched the way the octagonal pupils responded dutifully to the changing angles of light. “A chop shop in Mos Eisley?”

If she expected him to answer, she didn’t wait for him to do so, holding the probe with all but her index finger and instructing, “Follow my finger.” It floated across his field of view, dragging his eyes side to side, up and down, until she seemed satisfied with the results. 

It might have been fine if things had ended there, but Kalonia left his jaw and reached to touch his right eye. He jerked away as if burned, a fissure of panic at having someone so close to his eyes lancing through Rey’s gut and spiking into her brain. She couldn’t blame him; it didn’t go so well for him the last time. 

“Sorry,” he mumbled, but didn’t make any attempt to allow her access, head still turned as far away as his neck allowed. Tendons lie taut beneath his skin. 

The Major paused in mid-air, questions and uncertainty crackling in the space around her. She looked to be starting to twig to the situation, and her words crept out in a slow crawl. “That’s alright, dear.” 

"You should go slowly," Rey cautioned, beginning to feel his fear abate, but only just. "They're sensitive." 

"I'll say,” Kalonia muttered. “Do they always look… like this?"

"Yes,” he admitted. He wouldn’t lift his gaze from the examination table. 

A grimace conveying what she thought of that statement, Kalonia squeezed the bridge of her nose. Having learned from her mistake, she splayed her hand. “I want to take a look at your eyelids, but I’m going to need to touch you. Sound okay?” 

Unsure if it would carry or if it would only perturb him more, Rey couldn’t help but whisper wordlessly into the air between them, _She’s not going to hurt you_. She prayed he allowed the thought to slip into his subconscious and take hold. 

It took a moment, and it was subtle, but eventually he seemed to listen. 

His breath began to slow, and his shoulders lowered slightly from where he had locked them into place. He nodded quickly, as if to do so before he lost the nerve, and the Major wasted no time in beginning. Although it was clear he wanted anything but, Hux suffered through the careful inspection, jaw jutting forward, hands balled into the fabric of his shirt so tightly Rey believed it might rip. His breath had sped up again, short and uneven, nerves firing and prickling even the back of her neck with disquiet. Thankfully for both of them, Kalonia didn’t protract the affair, having seen apparently all she needed to. 

As the Major headed for one of the racks on the far side of the room, he bent his head and pressed hard into the sockets with his knuckles. He’d done this repeatedly the night before, sometimes accompanied by frantic rubbing, sometimes not. It didn’t seem to leave his eyes anything but sore and red and worse off than before. 

Her curiosity winning out over discretion, she kept her voice low. “Does doing that really help?”

He didn’t remove his fists, only biting his lip for a moment before answering haltingly, “The pressure confuses the sensors and convolutes the pain signal.” 

Not knowing what else to say, Rey managed, “Oh.” Never having had prosthetics herself, it seemed akin to shaking and squeezing her hand after the times she’d gotten it pinched in rusted-out Imperial hardware, snapped unexpectedly shut. 

Unable to hear their exchange, Rey could hear Kalonia fuming, as much to her med stock as to them, “Unbelievable. Whoever performed these should have lost their license.” 

Hux barely moved his lips, and she had to strain to hear him. “Something tells me they didn’t have one.” 

Rey snorted – she couldn’t help it. 

It seemed wrong to laugh, but after the kind of night she’d had she couldn’t bite back the sharp puff of air for all the stars in the Galaxy. Something in the way he didn’t flinch at the sound, full lips for once not twisted into a frightened grimace, made her hope it was an actual attempt at humor… if only for her ears. 

Drawn by the noise, Kalonia took stock of his position and cringed. "Thomas, don’t touch them. You’re just making it worse." 

His hands lowered slowly at the command, revealing the harsh coloration Rey knew would be there, skin stark and cold against the inflamed rims. Kalonia tutted as she returned, arms laden with compounds Rey couldn’t even name, and settled them brusquely in his lap. It didn’t offer much surface area and they tilted every which way; he struggled to keep them from falling.

"They lacerated your right tear duct, and the insides of your eyelids are severely abraded – mostly because you keep pressing on them. Twice a day with this,” she held up two tubes of ointment, one of them Bacta,“for the tear duct and the residual external scarring, and a drop each of these two for the chronic inflammation. Got it?" 

He looked pitiful sitting there, his lap covered with tubes and bottles. “I got it.” 

“Good. Now shirt off.” 

Wondering if the lurch in her stomach was entirely hers, Rey didn’t have to speak – he beat her to it, eyes wide. "Why?" 

“Leia ordered a full physical. And, given the look of these,” she gestured abstractly to the bruises ringing his throat, “it’s my professional opinion that it’s justified.”

If he had been unhappy before it had certainly only intensified now, shaking hands slowly setting aside the contents of his lap before gathering the tattered hem of his shirt. Skin bristling at the discomfort rolling off him, Rey caught his eye briefly before turning her back, taking a few steps towards one of the supply racks in order to give them the semblance of privacy. 

It made sense that Leia would want a complete analysis of Hux’s physical state; it might yield information that could prove elucidating, or at the very least, useful. They still had few answers to a galaxy’s worth of questions, most of which pertained to how the third-highest ranking member of the Order found himself, wiped and broken, on a death gang reaving ship. Was it through the slave markets, as the sex designation on his forehead implied? Or was he purposefully installed there as punishment? Or, as her mind supplied quietly, as a plant?

Pretending to read the labels of the various medical preparations, Rey tried to tune out the by-the-book procedure taking place behind her. These weren’t questions she was qualified or willing to answer, and trawling through his memories hadn’t provided much of anything beyond confirmation of the situation as it was. Leia had decided to wait and see, so wait and see they would. 

His yelp, high-pitched and sudden, had her reflexively whirling on her heel.

Technically, Rey didn’t mean to stare. That didn’t mean it wasn’t happening. 

She’d known he was slender, even beneath that garish yellow shirt it was obvious. But several paces away, Rey could still practically count his ribs, body hunched and shivering. The vivid images of the slop hitting the floor instead of his stomach jumped to mind, the pangs and sleeplessness of hungry nights finding many a twin in her own memories. 

That wasn’t what caught her breath, however. 

It was the sickly bruise in more colors than the desert had taught her to name, an obscene chiaroscuro against the paleness of his skin that stretched from armpit to hip. She couldn’t begin to fathom what might have left a nebula so sprawling, but she’d seen enough scavengers kicked in fights over loot to put forth a few ideas. 

It didn’t take long for her scrutiny to register, his gaze creeping from behind the lank strands of his hair to meet her own. A flush crept up his neck. 

Rey turned away, wondering how he ever could have worn the title of general. 

\-----

It had taken two days. 

Analyzing the direction her feet were taking her, Rey couldn’t decide if it would be more accurate to say _only_ two days or rather that it was surprising it had taken two _days_ at all. Leia had proven instantly receptive to the idea when it was presented to her; so receptive, in fact, that if surprise had registered at all, Rey had certainly missed it by a single blink. 

The new orders had been relayed out immediately, and like that, Rey was base-bound for the foreseeable future. While it wouldn’t help the affairs of the Resistance, it might at least do a thing or two to improve her internal clock. Long journeys off-planet tended to muddle her sleep schedule even worse than it already was. 

The reminder of nightfall and what it tended to bring only added to her trepidation, as the small mirror she’d borrowed personally from Leia now resting on her nightstand could attest. Insomnia had been an old acquaintance on Jakku, empty and stretching like the Dead Quarter with only imaginings for company. It was innocuous compared to now, however, to the restraints and the popping and the pain – once the nightmares began, she couldn’t claw free. And once she awoke, she couldn’t force herself to risk falling back into their grip. 

They were part of the reason she’d requested this. 

Being in the field, whether it was investigating leads about Order troop movements or tracking down new sources of Khyber crystals, was terrifying in and of itself. Whatever the task, no matter how small, required a fantastic level of focus she couldn’t honestly muster at the moment. The chance of a mistake was too high, and the consequences too dear to jeopardize the Resistance with her… distraction. 

That was the reasoning she’d laid out before Leia, and it was certainly true. 

It just wasn’t the full story. 

Quite frankly, Rey felt responsible – responsible for finding him, responsible for bringing him to base and burdening the Resistance with an impossible problem, and, now that he was there, responsible for his well-being. She’d rescued him, as he fervently believed, and while the low-ranking underling assigned to manage him had seemed harmless enough, Rey knew enough about human nature to doubt his intentions. Practicality and distrust burned into the fabric of a scavenger after a while, the sun and sand wearing away the soft places not occupied by survival. It demanded a bleak read of every situation, lest a misstep prove fatal in any number of ways. It was very possible, probable even, that no one on base would put up much of a fuss if the man who had once been an enemy was treated less than civilly, or, worse yet, met with an untimely accident. 

Rey trusted Leia, and most of the pilots. 

But everyone?

One couldn’t trust everyone. 

Besides, the respite from field missions meant more time devoted to training, to sharpening her focus and her prowess in the arena that, in her heart of hearts, she knew would decide the war. Meditation and practice would not interfere with minding Hux, and if she was being honest, closing herself off from his raw openness was a training exercise in and of itself. The torrent buffeting her senses like a sea wind reminded her of another – more brutal but nonetheless as fear-drenched – mind. 

All too soon, her feet had carried her to her destination. 

She didn’t know how his former warden had negotiated the external locking mechanism, but Rey decided to go with the simplest approach. Three heavy knocks to the solid metal paneling, a minute or three pause she hoped was respectable, then the rapid input of the keycode to the small console recessed into the wall. The hydraulics hissed as the door retracted, and Rey stepped inside. 

The room was empty. 

A bolt of alarm tore through her, but it receded quickly at the light pouring from the open doorway of the tiny bathroom. Crossing her arms, Rey waited awkwardly just inside the bedroom’s entrance. 

Like everything in the base, the room was small despite its designation as officer’s quarters, approximately the same size as the one she’d claimed a few corridors over. Its entire contents comprised a single bed, a shelf that doubled as a nightstand, and a panel Rey knew to be a closet built into the far wall. The stripped look contrasted sharply with the colorful odds and ends with which she’d meticulously festooned her space; if given enough time, and maybe he would be, Rey wondered if he’d do the same. 

As it was, the glint of something on the nightstand caught her eye. 

Copper wire, twisted into an ornate design and propped up against the wall. Some sort of tree? Rey couldn’t be sure. What she did know was that she’d be bringing a datapad preloaded with stories for him in the morning. 

Moments ticked by and faint sounds carried from the open doorway. He might not even know she’d entered. 

Unwilling to walk in on what might be a compromising scene, Rey settled for calling, “Are you alright in there?”

“Yeah, sorry I’ll just be – _fuck_ – “ The unmistakable clinking of something bouncing around the metal sink, and a hushed string of words she couldn’t quite make out, met her ears. 

Crisis apparently under control, his head popped out a second later. An anxious and heady rush that wasn’t hers suddenly flooding her chest, Rey had to take a deep breath as the rest of his body hesitantly followed suit to stand in the doorway. 

He was still wearing that stained and tattered shirt. That would have to change, Rey mentally noted. 

“I hadn’t, that is, I, I didn’t –” He began softly, fidgeting with the slim tube in his hands and scrutinizing its label like it held the mysteries of the Jedi, “I didn’t think I’d see you again.” 

Wanting to put him at ease, if only to stop the jangling of anxiety that thrummed in the air, she tried to joke, “Better get used to it, I’ve taken over for the sergeant so you’re stuck with me. I wanted to come by and tell you in person.”

A smile came to her mouth without much prodding. While he didn’t exactly return it, the slight wavering of the line of his lips looked like he tried to; that counted, Rey figured. They had probably long forgotten how. 

“You’re a powerful Jedi.” His voice rose slightly, lashes dusting his cheeks as his gaze fell to the ground, “You don’t have anything more important to do?”

 _Than waste time on me_ , Rey felt, rather than heard, him finish. 

Though she tried valiantly to block it, a stab of pity lanced her heart. “Who said this wasn’t important?”

While other people habitually guarded their emotions, whether or not they realized what they were doing, Hux’s mind – or what remained of it – was a broken valve. Twin waves of _I’m not important_ and _does she really think_ rose above the rest and slammed into her. Mind stuttering at the sudden influx from his end, Rey fought to keep her voice steady, the taxing effort of keeping his feelings at bay drawing out the truth, “Besides, you’re wrong – I’m no Jedi. And I probably never will be.”

Shunting aside thoughts of her half-completed training, Rey left the safety of the doorway and took a few steps closer. It was like wading through a patch of drowning sand. She needed the conversation to return to neutral territory, and she needed her barriers up. 

Mental wall in place, the onslaught dimmed to a nondescript hum and Rey felt like she could breathe again. “So has the room been alright?”

“It’s been wonderful.” 

He meant it too, she could guess. Spartan it might be, but it was clean and quiet and didn’t boil with the heat of server towers. 

And, ragged shirt aside, he looked better than the last time she’d seen him, led away by the sergeant and furtively looking back over his shoulder. Time under the ‘fresher’s water jets had done him some good, his hair a vibrant red without the caked on layers of grime. The long strands pleasantly framed his face rather than hanging limply against his cheeks. 

Her eyes crept to his; a glossy, wet sheen overlaid the perennial redness and extended out to the skin around it. Puzzled for a second, it clicked – right, Kalonia’s ointment. 

Noticing where her attention had strayed, he shrugged with one shoulder and voiced what she was already thinking. “I don’t know how much good they’re doing. It doesn’t help that I can never get the drops to go in.” 

“Need some help?” 

The words were out before she could stop them, hanging in the air like a life raft she hadn’t quite meant to toss. Mistake or not, Rey assured herself it was moot. It was unlikely he would allow her to touch him anyway. 

His slow nod was one of the last things she would have expected. “Yes, please.” 

“Okay, well…” She was struck by the reminder of how tall he was, despite the stoop of his shoulders. He eclipsed her by a couple hands at least. “You’re going to need to sit for me.” 

Retreating into the bathroom to grab the vials, he returned a moment later and sat on the edge of the neatly made bed. He looked at her expectantly, tucking his hair behind his ears, and it galvanized her feet to move. 

She removed the cap and wordlessly handed it to him. His fingers, long and slim, brushed against hers as he collected the tiny piece. The pads were smooth, so at odds with the callouses marring her own. 

He tipped his head backward, eyes wide and unblinking. The irises once more appeared black in the dim illumination of the room. 

Contrary to the wild spikes Kalonia had incited, there was very little fear emanating from him now, not that she could really tell with her shields established though. Hoping she wouldn’t change that, Rey gently rested a hand against his cheek, thumb caressing the delicate skin under his eye. 

He didn’t flinch at her touch.

A slight easing of her barriers suggested he maybe even liked it – any further than that though, she didn’t allow herself to analyze. She applied as little pressure as possible, drawing the lid downward while murmuring, “Look up.” 

Rey asked herself if she could see the General in the eyes peering artlessly up at her.

She couldn’t, and that was the problem. 

The drop hit home. 

\--------

Sparks showered the floor, raining like a smashed meteor onto his boots and tunic. They singed into the fabric, but he hardly felt it, hardly noticed. 

He’d deleted the uplink as soon as it had processed, the console for once smashed as a security measure – or at least he told himself as much. It certainly had nothing to do with the helpless rage coursing through his blood and commanding his arms to move, to act, to do – _something_.

Anything. 

No explanation. 

The source was scrambled. 

Still, it smacked of Force use to make such a definitive call about an individual’s mental state, and there were certainly plenty of unaffiliated users still left in the Galaxy. The Resistance too was a possible option, though somewhat discounted by the odds. The Galaxy was large and the Resistance, despite their bravado and posturing, were small; the chance that one individual crossed their path was unlikely. 

Kylo felt he was being reasonable in his assessment by omitting them. 

It certainly wasn’t due to the barely controlled terror at the image of Hux led before a firing squad. 

Nor the fact that the Rebels had again changed bases, fleeing to who knew what Force-damned system. 

The saber satisfied his hand much more than any thought could, the beam struggling to shake itself apart in his grip the same way his horror rattled his head. The hiss as it bit through metal and wiring was one he never tired of hearing. 

This was the first lead in ten months. 

And it was absolutely useless. 

His inquiries, if they could be called that, were delicate. A word here. A word there. Progress so slow Kylo had on more than one occasion almost split a contact belly to jaw in frustration. 

But it couldn’t be done any other way – not with Snoke almost definitely the cause. For the life of him, and he’d wracked his brain for months, Kylo couldn’t discern what had prompted it. He’d fully believed Hux had been forgiven for Starkiller. 

The failure was as much his own, Kylo thought. 

More, probably. 

Beam clicking off, plasma beam leaving a purple afterglow seared into his retinas, Kylo stopped to survey his handiwork. Smoke poured from the ruined console, and it wouldn’t be long before a crew would be dispatched to address the complaints of the smell. 

The new fool in charge, a walking talking paragon of incompetence, had demanded his presence at the beginning of Alpha shift. 

Thoughts of his General would have to wait.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some more of Kylo, as well as Finn. And things are never quite so easy for Hux.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has read, kudos'ed, and commented! I know this took a long time to come and I am not the most prompt in my replies, but I seriously cannot convey how much I appreciate the support. I hope that you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoy writing it. 
> 
> I'm somethingstately on Tumblr - everyone is always welcome to come talk about Clan Techie, Hux, Kylux, etc at any time!

Hux was _alive_.

The thought hung delicately suspended, the weight of a pendulum that etched shapes in the landscape of his head. It dominated his focus in a way Kylo hadn’t allowed during the day’s shifts, no matter how insistently it stalked his thoughts. He didn't need Snoke suspecting anything, the Supreme Leader did that well enough on his own. 

Alive. _Alive_.

In the beginning it was all he could think about, every stolen moment away from Snoke’s sight consumed by plans and questions – and rage, a veritable bonfire in the Force landscape. But as his leads had dried up, so had his hopes, and Kylo felt the familiar sickly sweet trickle of shame in his stomach. It was true, his thoughts had turned less and less as the time between them spanned ever wider. As weeks bled into months, and months into years, he’d wondered if he’d ever even know if Hux still lived. 

That, and if he could ever stop caring either way. 

Now that he did know, it was all he could do to contain the maelstrom it ignited, tamping down the order to _fight track hunt_ that clawed at his insides and scrabbled at his feet. No doubt some of the fervor was in atonement for his earlier loss of it. Fingers locked into a tight fist, he forced them to uncurl. 

Lifting his arm, his hand hovered directly over his face, skin prickling with every puff of his breath. Only a hair’s breadth separated fingertips and eyelashes, but in the impenetrable blackness of his quarters, it may as well been miles for all he could perceive it. 

This… situation seemed much the same. 

Letting his arm fall back to the bed, Kylo closed his eyes and focused on the steady rise and fall of his breath. Here, cocooned in darkness and the gentle kiss of sheets far softer than he ever would have chosen himself, the world was held at least partially at bay. Muted, removed, the cacophony of thousands of thoughts and heartbeats no longer mangling the lone melody of his self. 

His fingertips unthinkingly caressed the fabric over his chest, something akin to melancholy pooling heavy and intangible in the space where his heart might have been. 

He hadn’t ever minded their duet. 

Hux, face pressed into the pillow, leg and arm barely grazing his own – tethered without smothering, present without fanfare. During the day’s shifts he attired himself in efficiency, wore austerity, breathed composure. The steady creeping fingers of sleep would peel them all away, tempering the perpetual scowl. His thoughts had ebbed and flowed into dreams, and many a night Kylo had lied awake to the accompaniment of that tide, always lightly skimming wakefulness as the other man’s mind railed against the injustice, the weakness, of slumber. 

A twitch, the faint ghost of a grin, jostled the smooth line of Kylo’s mouth. He held a memory in his mind, a flickering firebug cupped between two palms. For once it wasn’t kindling for his rage. 

_The mussed firebrand of Hux’s hair, gel-locked strands knocked askew by the fist that had taken hold there earlier. Lips part and he is enraptured by the sight. His hand comes up without a thought, without real reason, fingertips trailing the full curve of it. The touch is rough, callouses catching against the softness, but it’s as gentle as his hands know how to be. Normally sharp gaze muzzled by sleep, an eye cracks open, and he’s always quietly admired Hux’s eyes, so, so –_

Kylo’s breath caught, and he shot upwards in bed. 

He couldn’t remember. 

“Lights.” 

Though little more than a harsh bark, the command lit the room. Blinking in the sudden illumination, Kylo found himself leaning, reaching into the drawer of the stand at his bedside, before his mind was fully conscious of giving the command. His fingers found their quarry without help from his eyes, excruciatingly familiar with the contents. 

He took them out less and less as time went on, but he could never actually forget. 

The leather was smooth against his fingertips, cool where once the heat of their owner would have lingered. The pads of the fingers, the heel of the hand were nearly worn through, damage that spoke more of age than the strenuousness of their use. The palm was riddled with minute indentations, the dig of nails strong enough to slowly, slowly bite through the leather. 

They were his favorites. 

If he concentrated, breath still coming fast, Kylo could feel their squeeze on his bicep, his chin. 

The sting of a backhand. 

They felt flimsy now without the warm solidness underneath, little more than an empty shell. He’d tried and failed to wear them after Hux had disappeared, thwarted by the sheer size of hands better suited to snapping and breaking and burning than the dignity of officer’s leather. 

_A keepsake. How pedestrian._

He could almost hear Hux saying it too. 

_Almost_ , because even that was beginning to fade, as much as he denied it. The crisp snap of consonants seemed duller, the dry wit somehow less lustrous when played through the distorter that was his memory. 

Trying not to crush the gloves in his fist, Kylo pushed back the sheet and heaved himself from the bed. Disrobing perfunctorily for bed, he had let the heavy layers litter the floor. There hadn’t been anyone to chide him for doing so, not in years, and he stepped over the shed tunics and mantles with barely a thought. 

There was one planet he could try first. If anyone knew anything about what happened in the Galaxy, it was the slavers. But it wasn't as simple as showing up uninvited - preparations needed to be made.

Sleep be damned.

\----------

Morning sunlight used to intrude uninvited into her half-sunken home, barging in and knocking on her eyelids until she dragged herself from bed. While she didn’t miss the heat or the sand or the crippling loneliness, the thought of sunlight sometimes planted a throbbing in her chest it could take hours to shake. Short ventures aboveground did little to soothe her melancholy, as barren and rocky as the land above the labyrinthine base. It was lit by a weak red star, so different than the main sequence giant she’d bent her head from her whole life. 

The alarm on her holopad woke her that morning with that sort of shroud hanging over her. 

Or at least it would have, if she had been sleeping. 

Clicking it off, she laid in the dark for a few moments more, the grime of a poor night’s sleep coating the insides of her as grit used to cover her skin. No ‘fresher would remove it, though it might help her feel something approaching human. Clinging to that thought, she roused herself from the sheets, hair tickling her neck where it spilled over her shoulders. Her muscles already ached and she hadn’t even started the day yet. 

The ‘fresher was sorely needed, if entirely too short once the rationing kicked in. Still, the splash of water felt as luxurious as always, faint aroma of salt and chlorine be damned. 

Stream reduced to a mere dribble, she reached blindly for the towel she’d slung over the bar. Water pattered onto the metal floor and cooled her skin in the slightly chilly air. Her stomach rumbled familiarly, peeved at the lack of recent offerings. 

As they had been doing quite often lately, her thoughts turned once more to him.

Rey didn’t know if he’d even left his quarters in the past two days. As far as she knew, he’d been left largely to his own devices, all meals delivered and without much for entertainment. It was no wonder he’d taken to intricate crafting, if the copper tree she’d spied on the nightstand was any indication. A holopad of stories was coming his way, but honestly, she thought uneasily, he probably needed to get out. Other people preferred a change of scenery and another voice or two besides the one in their head, as she’d learned. 

Not everyone could get used to the crushing weight of their own company. 

Toweled off, even if it pained a small part of her to sweep the water from her skin into a drain for recycling, Rey stepped from the ‘fresher and headed back into the bedroom. The lights, dim in power-saving mode, brightened rapidly with her movement. It might not be the smartest of ideas, but she didn’t have many alternatives. The mess hall would be sparsely populated this time of morning. First shift had begun an hour before, so the waves of officers and pilots had already broken and slowed to a trickle for the time being. It was why she’d set her alarm to its current time. It wasn’t that she disliked seeing acquaintances over breakfast, it was that she rather preferred not to compete for said breakfast with them. 

The presence of food, even rationed food, was one she liked to savor without anxiety. A whole host of hungry pilots, absently jostling and angling to be first in line for the caf, was one of the last things her lingering food insecurity needed. 

Fingers carding through the wet strands of her hair, Rey frowned grimly. Hux probably understood it too now – that was, if he hadn’t already before, she conceded grudgingly, recalling what Finn had shared about Order rations. While the infertility of the rocky planet downsized typical Resistance fare, the spread was still a cornucopia compared to a Destroyer’s. 

Of course, Rey would have gladly taken either regimen for most of her life, but that was neither here nor there.

Plan more or less in place, and by that, she meant vague details she prayed she wouldn’t regret, Rey pulled on her trousers and tunic. The holopad she’d procured last night lay on top of the neatly folded shirt she’d found in the commissary, long-sleeved and black and hopefully a better fit for his frame. Even if it wouldn’t quite pass his wrists, at least she’d found one though, unlike a sufficiently long pair of trousers – that was a problem for another day. 

Her fingers made short work of her hair, corralling bunches together as much as the residual dampness would allow. It wasn’t quite as she liked it, a quick glance in the ‘fresher mirror revealed, but it would do for now. 

Scooping up the gifts, and she supposed that’s what they were (if paltry), Rey left her quarters and made the short jaunt to his. She drew up short outside the door, worrying her lip as her fist hovered just over the metal panel. Without an alarm, there was a good chance he wasn’t up. 

The decision flip-flopped back and forth in her head before finally landing on an option. Well, needs must, and after all – there were quite a few on base that would grumble to hear the worst thing that had happened to General Hux was being roused prematurely for breakfast. Putting it that way made her feel a little guiltily foolish for even deliberating, if only in her own head, and she struggled to swallow her concern. 

Rey knocked, paused perhaps slightly longer than she had the night before, and showed herself in.

The panel slid back to reveal him bent at the waist, dexterously tucking starched sheets under the weight of the mattress. He even had the top neatly turned down, she noted, a flourish she recalled from Finn’s bunk that might have given her pause if she hadn’t crept through his mind herself. The precise folds put the balled up mess on her own bed to shame. But it wasn’t like anyone else was going to see it, she told herself – and even if they did, she certainly wouldn’t care. Pulling sheets loose at the end of the day was time that could be used for sleeping, or in her case, staring at the ceiling. 

He looked up as she entered, hands stuttering to a halt and back cracking as he jerkily straightened. His voice was still a little hoarse, grains of sleep clinging to the underside. “Good morning.” 

“Morning.” She felt tongue-tied for a second, still unsure how all this was supposed to go, before revealing, “Thought we might try the mess for breakfast today.” 

His brows knitted, in skepticism or guarded anticipation, it was hard to tell. “Really?” 

She shrugged, glad at least that he wasn’t that fearful of the idea. Granted that could change once they got there. “If you’re up for it, figured you might want to get out.”

He didn’t deny it, but confirmation wasn’t exactly forthcoming in the tight uncertainty gripping his expression either. Shifting her weight, Rey tried, “And, I brought you something.” She lobbed the shirt towards him, watching as hands flew up to catch it. “Hopefully it fits.”

Running a hand almost reverently over the fabric, Hux swallowed. Uncertainty melting into something else, his Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat. “This is for me?” 

“If you want it.”

“May I?”

He looked up, and for a moment, Rey wondered if she had worn the same expression a couple years before. Absently, she fingered the seam of her trousers, the ones Leia had given her. 

“Go ahead.” 

Unsure if he meant to change right there in front of her, Rey nonetheless breathed a grateful sigh when he made for the ‘fresher instead. She’d already intruded enough on his privacy with the glimpse she’d caught in med bay. Still, the bruises would probably be a different palette of colors by now, though nonetheless sickly. Idly, she wondered if he should be putting hot compresses on them, and if he’d need help with the drops or – 

Almost without meaning to, she felt the shift in her awareness.

Even hidden behind the gauze of the partial barriers she’d put up, the glow of his mind cast shadows in her own head. _So clean, and so warm_ was the most insistent impression, fingertips light as they danced over the ghost of blood stains no longer there. No longer there, and – 

_No longer theirs._

Smiling faintly to herself, she cautiously lowered the walls, feeling her heart ache with the thoughts swirling just beyond her sight. She almost didn’t have to use the Force to know exactly what he felt, feelings so great for a gift ultimately so simple, so small. 

The ‘fresher door slid smoothly open, and he stepped back into the room. He’d tucked his hair neatly behind his ears, strands carefully swept back to reveal the hollows of his cheeks. 

Only she wasn’t really looking – not at that. It required only a fraction of a second for her to realize her mistake. 

Black shirt. Black trousers. 

_Oh._

Nostalgia waned as her grimace fully took root. Did he even know what the General looked like? Probably not, she figured uneasily, praying she wouldn’t have to be the one that showed him. At a loss for words, her jaw clenched. Stars only knew what her face looked like. 

Hux withered under her scrutiny, expression crumpling the longer she stared. The momentary flash of happiness curdled and an oil slick of doubt crested on his thoughts, and she could feel him retreating, pulling back mentally as much as he tried to fold in on himself physically. The tattered yellow shirt was balled in one fist, the other that had hung at his side now clenching the hem of the one he wore. 

“Is something wrong?” His voice was small. _Can’t even do this right._ echoed in her head. 

The self-loathing contained in the thought made her flinch. 

She wanted to take it back, to order him to change, but the command died on her tongue. She couldn’t, not after what she’d just felt in the ‘fresher, not after watching him wilt in front of her. _He wore black_ was vague and petty and indeterminate. It wasn’t a reason worth corrupting an experience that had been for her quite a lovely one – a joining, a belonging, a safety she could physically hold and point to. 

It might be salvaged yet, she told herself.

It only had to be until she could find another color. 

“No, nothing’s wrong,” she forced out. Her mind cast out for a reason, and scattered words coalesced into something that could be stretched into the truth. “You just look so pale, I – are you feeling okay?”

Rey had a feeling he was trusting – or desperate – enough to have accepted anything she said at that moment. 

As it was, his shoulders almost sagged in relief, and she could feel the confusion and shame mostly dissipate from his thoughts. Some still remained, of course – he wasn’t stupid, despite his yearning to believe her. But he didn’t question her further, and for that she was grateful. Content that the damage had been checked, and drained by the encounter, she raised her barriers again. That was certainly enough mental acrobatics until at least she’d had her cup of caf. 

As she did so, he gave a soft snort, one she was slowly coming to learn was one of the few capable of bleeding through his solemnity – first in the med bay and then now, not counting the hopeless half-laugh, half-sob variety he’d uttered during the… interrogation, that was. Her heart pitied that it, and any bright thing such as laughter really, was over darkness like this. 

Oblivious to her thoughts, he said, “That’s nothing new… I’ve always looked a little half-dead in black. These,” he shyly gestured to his eyes, inflamed rims glistening again with ointment, “don’t help much either.” 

The wan cast to his skin, set in sharp relief by the color, did little to refute the statement. It echoed and underlined the dark circles clinging beneath his eyes, the dark circles _of_ his eyes. 

“Well, maybe a little,” she conceded honestly. “But this is better than the other. It looks…”

It skimmed his sides, suggesting leanness without revealing the awful truth of just _how_ so, and emphasized the thin length of his arms.

They were rather long indeed – like his legs. Resisting the stray urge to remind herself just how long, she finished lamely, “Nice.” 

He glanced downwards, and if a faint stain rose over his cheeks, Rey resolutely ignored it. 

“So. Breakfast?”  
\----

Rey didn’t like to talk while she ate. 

She didn’t much like to do _anything_ while there was food in front of her, really. Idle long enough, and there was too great a chance of that food amassing unpalatable levels of grit or walking off with someone else. 

Or – thinking back on the few things she’d caught in the desert over the years – walking off by itself. 

Silence held court between them, punctuated by the clink of silverware and the satisfying crunch of bread crust. _Companionable_ was the first word to come to mind when she tore her eyes away from her own plate long enough to focus on the world around her, and currently, much of that world was dominated by him. While she’d have liked to ascribe her singular focus to curiosity, or maybe good hospitality, it was honestly as much due to blocking out the stares of the few people in the mess as anything else. 

Stares, certainly, and the poorly concealed pointing - she couldn’t quite forget that. 

Still, it could be a lot worse, she figured. At least he was out of his room and stretching his legs, and no one other than a disgruntled line cook had seriously bothered them yet. Plus that little incident had been due to Hux’s stammered request for more _pink mush, please_ , so really, all in all a normal morning.

Hux was clearly content with her mealtime ritual, tucking eagerly into his own plate with a voracity she didn’t care to dwell on. Fork in his left hand, he kept firm hold of his caf mug with his right. Every so often he would lift it to his lips, eyes fluttering closed. How long had it been since he'd had it?

Despite the stares on his back, or maybe because of them, he didn’t look up from his own meal. 

Time trickled by as they finished their share, _share_ because she’d vowed that _portions_ would never leave her mouth again. The datapad she’d forgotten to give him earlier sat on the table beside her, now a post-breakfast present rather than a pre-breakfast one. He was scraping up the last remnants and Rey was left with only caf, lukewarm and still cooling. Others tended to down it at once but she’d had more than her fair share of hot liquids in life, thank you. 

Taking a sip, she savored the bitter rush over her palate. After the night she’d had, one of many, caf was one of the few things still keeping her sane. 

Beyond practical matters, and the traumatic memories clinging like engine grease to the heels of her thoughts, she didn’t know what to talk about. And for once, her upbringing wasn’t to blame. 

Rather it was the question rattling around her head like a can of bones. Did knowing his memories were forged invalidate them? That someone else had sketched out the frame, and the brain, too-clever at fabricating patterns from random data, had filled in the minutiae that made life real? They were certainly valid to him, that much was certain. He seemed to think her probing had finally convinced the Resistance he was actually Thomas, and so far no one had disabused him of the notion. Doubtless it would come out eventually, and Rey shifted uncomfortably at the thought. 

If he knew the truth, knew to look for the faint hazy glow, would they still be valid?

Rey paused, a mouthful of caf pausing too. Her own earliest memories bore the same glow, and yet, still, their threads constituted the fabric of her inner self, the woman she knew as _Rey_. 

She swallowed. 

That settled it. 

“What did you do? Before, I mean.” 

The last bite of reconstituted egg from a species she’d never heard of halfway to his mouth, Hux finally glanced upwards. His hand lowered to his plate, and a bit of food fell off. Eyes flicking to it, she almost missed the slight tightening of his jaw. 

Almost. 

“You didn’t see all that already?”

She covered her surprise behind another sip. Truth was, she hadn’t bothered thumbing through the false ones. “A mind is a crowded place. There was a lot to look at, and I was otherwise occupied.”

It was readily apparent with what. 

While bantha fodder to her own ears, the explanation came cocooned in Jedi-like vagueness and seemed to suffice. He busied himself with chasing the egg he’d lost, his words low. “I worked at a spaceport, arranging incoming and outgoing ships. It was pretty small, nothing like what’s on the Core Worlds. But I managed the network and supply levels decently enough.” 

“And that’s why the gang took you?” Rey could have kicked herself, but it was already out in the open. _Engaging_ with the memories didn’t mean riling them. 

“I guess so. I don’t know.” Tightness giving way to a full cringe, he tried to press his free hand against one eye, clearly agitated. A second too late he remembered the ointment, snapping away like a cut rubber band. It smeared, glossy and wet, over his knuckles, down his cheek. “It wasn’t like I asked. Well – I mean, I, I did, but –” 

Hux cut off there, instead bringing the eggs he’d re-assembled back to his mouth. He chewed for a moment to collect himself, movement mechanical, before adding quietly, “I figured it was because I was an easy target.”

She wanted to say, _Trust me, you were anything but_. 

Wisely, however, the words remained trapped in her mouth. Instead, she offered, “I’m sure that’s not true.” No need for him to think it more than an empty platitude, the kind anyone might provide when prompted. 

“Yeah, well… doesn’t matter now, I guess.”

He half-shrugged, the movement drawing attention to the lurid red of his hair where it brushed the black covering narrow shoulders. She’d seen red giants during her time with the Resistance, impossibly large orbs hanging suspended in the blackness. There was something to be said for the resemblance. 

His fork clinked as he laid it on his plate, the jangling of metal on metal revealing the lingering tremor to his fingers. Still, his voice held relatively steady. “What about you – were you always with the Resistance?”

She chuckled softly, ignoring the twinge in her chest. _If only._ “No.”

A few moments passed, anything else she might have added sticking together to stopper her throat. When she didn’t elaborate, he hesitantly tried again. “Then what was your home planet like?”

“It wasn’t.” 

“Oh. I see.” His tone suggested he did anything but, and his hands fled to his lap – which, judging by the intensity of his stare, suddenly contained the most interesting artifact in the Galaxy. Irises large and black, he bored holes in his trousers. 

Oiling the joints of her tongue, she somehow convinced it to work properly again. The words tumbled like lead, slick and heavy. “Jakku wasn’t my home planet because someone left me there, mind-wiped as a kid. I was a scavenger.”

“Jakku?” His brow crinkled. “Why does that sound familiar?”

Rey hadn’t quite expected this to come up so soon, and of all the parts of that statement to focus on, he picked the least likely in her book to be interesting. Well, at least it was the one possible question she had an answer to. 

“The last battle with the Empire.”

“Right.” His brow smoothed, a cautious nod. “I remember learning about that growing up.”

 _I bet you did_. Shoving the thought aside, Rey wished she had something to busy her hands with besides caf. Maybe there was something to be said for eating slowly after all. “Hence the scavenger part. Spent most of my life inside the wreckage actually, I even lived in it.”

His eyes widened in surprise, and Rey was struck partially anew by the reminder that, apparently, this wasn’t a typical experience for most people. Unblinking, pupils whirring, they effortlessly pinned her to her seat. “You really went _into_ those things?" 

Her thumb softly grazed the metal of her caf mug. "That’s an understatement. Went into them and I – well, _we_ –gutted them." 

He leaned closer, a barely perceptible amount, but still, there it was. “Did you see their computer systems?”

“Sometimes. Pieces of them, when I was younger.” She swallowed another gulp of caf, unfortunately one of the last a quick glance revealed. “Installed part of a Destroyer console computer in my speeder for nav, actually. But those were the first to go, so mostly I went for the scraps that were harder to reach. Less competition that way.”

He shook his head, seemingly unable to believe what he was hearing. The curiosity and eagerness in his expression _should_ be perturbing her, the over-cautious part of her brain needled. In fact, it was the part that sounded a hell of a lot like Finn.

But looking at him, the soft wonder brightening his visage like the first few cracks of sunrise, she felt it impossible to care. 

"The death gang pulled hardware from scuttled ships in other systems. Not me, I mean, I wasn’t allowed off the ship,” he explained with a quick dip of his head, but it wasn't long and his tone quickly picked up, “but I’ve never seen anything like what they brought back. Still fast, if you knew what to fix, and so fascinating. I took apart a good deal of it, even ended up building most of the server towers myself out of reclaimed parts. There was this one wreck –” 

Listening to him speak, Rey felt two things. 

The first was that Poe might have been right about the slight speech impediment. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but that probably hadn't belonged to the General. 

The second was relief, coursing like numbing agent through her veins. Relief that for once, there was someone who wouldn’t vilify what had once been the only intellectual passion in her empty life. And, arguably more important, that no one had dared drift close enough to pick up on their conversation. The memory of the server room, the low thrum of machinery riding a wave of boiling heat, rolled over her and melded with that of a hot, hot sun. Spending so much time like that, surrounded by nothing but technology – Rey knew how you could get lost in it, the reminder of what it had been used for little more than a dull afterthought in the wake of such sublime beauty. 

Rey had quite a few feelings, both technical and personal, about Resurgent and Executor class ships. 

The present company, time, and place were unfortunately not the most appropriate environment to share them. In fact, if a worse arrangement existed, she certainly couldn’t envision it. Well, actually, no – Finn could also have been there, and why not throw in Leia too?

Holding up a hand, Rey brought his rush of words to a standstill. He stopped halfway through his story, stuttering to a halt on the precipice of her reply. 

“I agree with you, Thomas, but listen, that sort of talk might not be the best in public … with the Resistance.”

Chin tucking towards his chest, his eyes slipped closed for a long moment. “Right. Sorry.”

 _Can’t even do this right_. 

The memory of what he’d projected earlier floated like cream to the surface of her mind, and she had no doubt that if she lowered her barriers, she’d hear it again. 

Wincing a little herself, she tried to cushion the blow. “It’s completely fine, really. No harm done, I just don’t want anyone else getting the wrong idea.” 

Rey was content to leave it at that, letting him think it was purely due to politics. Still, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a similar discussion, and the question was dropping from her mouth before she could shove it back in. 

“I would love to talk more about it later, if you want?” 

While he still couldn’t look her in the eye, he sounded cautiously optimistic. “Yeah?”

About to answer, the words caught in her throat at the sight of Finn over his shoulder, making for their table like a ship on impulse drive. If he was in the mess at this hour it was not a coincidence, and Rey wondered if his frustration had cooled any in the intervening days. Judging by the slight hesitance in his walk, covered sloppily by a false bravado he copied off Poe, _cooled_ might not prove too fantastic a dream. 

Either way, though, this was going to be a bit of an unpleasant flashback for Hux. The last time he'd seen Finn, he'd been pulled from his seat and pinned to the floor. 

Rey groaned internally; they’d made such progress too. 

As expected, when Finn finally crossed the scuffed metal floor and dropped into the seat next to Hux a moment later, the latter flinched. Shying away to the point she was afraid he would fall off his chair, it was obvious he would have preferred to leave. But that, unfortunately, required somewhere to go. 

“Hi, Finn.” 

“’Morning, Rey.” He pointedly ended the pleasantries there.

While his greeting may have been directed to her, little else was. She followed his line of sight, doubtful and probing, to land on the pale man doing his best to simultaneously put as much space between the two of them while taking up as little of it as possible. There was a flower on Ach-To, she recalled, tracing the crumpled curve to his shoulders, whose bloom would shrivel shut at the slightest provocation. Her own version, remarkably a similar shade of red and white as the original, now sat silent and almost shivering, gaze flicking to hers to beg what to do. 

That all depended on Finn, she supposed – who, by the look of him, was almost as taut.

Breaking his stare, apparently satisfied, Finn settled a little more into his chair. Fear and anger no longer radiated quite as strongly from him, the feelings having more or less degraded into resignation and uncertainty. While she could appreciate Finn's instinct to protect his new family, it seemed at least that Hux had been downgraded from _maximum threat_ to _wait and see_ , a shift she was grateful for. Rey had to wonder if Leia had spoken with him recently, and decided she probably had – the General could kindle or soothe by turns, depending on what was needed. She wondered what was said.

“New shirt, huh Thomas?”

“Y-yes." Hux mumbled, a flush deepening on his cheeks, and stars, he really didn’t hide anything, did he? "Rey gave it to me."

Finn turned to face her. He didn’t have to say a word, his look spoke volumes. 

Cognizant of the irritation bubbling up inside her, not so much at him as at herself, she resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She’d been so kriffing tired when she’d gone looking for a shirt, that particular consideration hadn’t even crossed her mind. “I _know_ , Finn, I know.” 

“Just checking.” He swallowed, seemingly regrouping. “So, uh, do you want to come by sometime? You…" His eyes flicked to Hux before coming back to her, "Just you. Talk, hang out, you know. A lot has happened recently.”

His tone may have been reaching for casual, but it couldn’t quite make purchase. The _I miss you_ hung in the air between them.

Days had passed since they’d last properly spoken, and every interaction since Hux’s discovery had been tainted more or less by it. For two years, Finn had been an integral part of her life, a column and strut that helped to give the whole thing shape. Three days without him, and worse yet, of feuding with him, was surprisingly more painful than past-Rey, staring at the sunset through a sand-blasted visor, would have thought. 

Sparing a glance to Hux, his arms curled around himself, Rey quashed the niggling thought that she shouldn’t be leaving him alone. But it wasn’t like she was expected to spend every moment with him, she reminded herself, and he’d be fine for an evening on his own. 

Plus the plain fact of the matter was that she’d missed Finn terribly, and any chance to make amends was one she couldn’t afford to miss. 

“I’d like that. Tomorrow night sound okay?”

The straight line of his shoulders relaxed, bowing under the weight of his relief. “Yes, perfect. Thank you.”

Certainly he hadn’t thought she would refuse? There was more chance of a rancor passing on dinner.

“Of course.” 

They shared a half-smile, a moment where things weren't any different than they ever had been, before Finn seemed to realize exactly where he was, and unfortunately, just who was sitting at his side. 

“So, yeah.” Clearing his throat, Finn shifted in his seat. “I said I’d help Poe with something, so I’ll just…” He thumbed over his shoulder, and she waved him dutifully on. 

“Don’t let us keep you.” Sadness crept into her smile. “Say hello to Poe for me.” 

“Will do. See you tomorrow, Rey.” 

Finn snapped out a curt nod to Hux, before pushing himself up from the table and walking away. His hands were burrowed in the pockets of his jacket, but his step seemed a bit lighter than it had on his way over. 

Her stare trained on his retreating back, Rey said, “Thomas, can I ask you something?”

“Anything.” The soft puff of the word came without hesitation. His body hadn’t relaxed, and it probably wouldn’t for a little while longer, if her read of his memories had been right. The gang had tended to return for more, especially if they thought he’d let down his guard. 

Shuddering a little at the thought, Rey grounded herself and asked, low and to the point, “Why didn’t you ask about the mind-wiping? Or who left me?”

He cocked his head, and unlike safety, the words came easily. He only seemed surprised she was asking at all. “It didn’t sound like something you want to talk about.” 

Rey nodded tightly, _thank you_ stuck in her throat.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The General was iron, and Thomas was clay. Brittle and so easy to break. 
> 
> And Kylo gets a step closer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone for your continued support - it's been remarkable and wonderful to read your comments (and see your kudos). Thank you to everyone who has read!

She had given him the datapad after breakfast, casually handing it over as they’d wound through the base corridors to his quarters. It was nothing, she’d demurred, just a little something to keep him entertained on top of her sparkling company. A soft gasp of surprise, the beginnings of what she fervently hoped were a smile – sure, she’d half-expected, or at least hoped for, those. 

What she hadn’t expected was for him to stop short in the middle of the bustling hallway, rising out of the current of personnel like the rocks around Ach-To. And like those rocks, a wave, made of distracted pilot instead of water, had slammed into him. Scavenger reflexes were the only thing that had kept him from toppling. 

She’d later learn that he hadn’t had access to fresh reading material in two years, as the flawless and surprisingly dramatic recitations from memory of _On Enemy Shores: the Life and Times of Daritha Xim_ and _The Complete Works of Hako Armado_ could attest. At the time, however, she’d practically had to drag him the rest of the way, fielding a veritable barrage of _thank you thank you_ ’s and _but you didn’t have to_ ’s until they arrived at his door. 

It had been days since a staff had met her hands and so she’d left him with his gift, clutched to his chest as he settled himself on the bed. Hours of sparring with a droid had left her pleasantly sore and blissfully at peace, and as she unwound the tape from her palms, she’d wondered idly if he was feeling the same way, curled up in bed half a base away.

He must have read most the night. 

Rey knew, because for the first time in days, she did not dream. 

That morning saw her sitting in his quarters, a tray with two empty bowls, two mugs of caf, and not a single leftover crumb on his nightstand. She had the whole day to kill before she went to Finn’s, and spending it reading with Hux not only did so faster but made her feel a little better about leaving him on his own. Her datapad screen lit up in her lap, Rey shifted on the hard-backed metal chair she’d dragged in from command a couple hours ago. Back pressed against the headboard and knees drawn, tight and graceless, up to his chin, he’d shyly invited her to share the comfortable space provided by the bed. If _share_ was really the appropriate term when he’d ceded her roughly eighty-five or ninety percent of it. 

Knowing that if she’d taken him up on the offer he’d probably sit like that until time itself ended rather than disturb her, she’d opted for fetching a chair. At least this way he could extend his legs. 

Much easier, and more comfortable for him. Her bottom had personally seen worse. 

A word hadn’t punctured the silence for an hour, maybe more, when he tugged at the line of her concentration, submerged as it was in her book. 

“Can I watch you train?” A beat, and then more hesitantly, ”You do train, right? I thought all Jedis do.” 

It was an odd choice of tense, even with his continued and erroneous inclusion of her in their number. _All Jedis_ did _maybe_. 

Seeing as how there was exactly one left, Rey didn’t know if she could consider herself an expert on what Jedis did or did not do. She only knew what Luke did or did not do, and the latter category consisted largely of _fully train Rey_ and _forget the past_.

That line of thought was shoved away as soon as it materialized, and she focused on her pleasant surprise that he was even interested. There wasn’t any harm in it, she didn’t think. From what she had seen, Force usage in the Order far eclipsed her current skills. “Yeah, you can watch me, but fair warning, it might be rather boring.”

“I don’t think that’s possible,” he quietly replied, retreating to his story as if he hadn’t said anything at all. 

A warmth suffusing through her, Rey smiled to herself and tried to discern where she’d left off. Given that it was a history manuscript, and not a particularly lively one at that, the blocks of text weren’t exactly conducive to the endeavor. Still, she had tackled worse in her attempt to catch up on the education Jakku had denied her. Recently she’d binged on analyses of the Clone Wars and the rise of the Empire, trying to learn as much about her enemy’s roots as was possible. 

But really, the more she read, the more she realized – she needn’t have bothered specializing in a particular empire, or even a particular time period. For millennia the Galaxy had been at war with itself, a serpent eating its own tail, an ever-rolling wheel. Factions vied for dominance and names changed, yet the goal on both sides was always somehow ‘for the better.’ 

Everyone had a different idea about what that meant – and about how to achieve it. 

To her knowledge, only one so far had been mad enough to try to end it in one blow. 

Unthinkingly she found herself looking at Hux, the uneasiness of her former thought slipping away as she watched him read. The rapid movements of the large pupils, the quick flicks of his thumb as he finished another page in the time it took her to read a third of one – they were mesmerizing. Every so often he would squint slightly, and micro-expressions flitted over his face like clouds over moons. Though her barriers were up today, she could still feel the contentment bubbling from his mind, the glow just beyond her thoughts rather calming. 

She almost hated disturbing him, but her curiosity won out. “How does your brain keep up?” 

He looked up, blinking owlishly as he attempted to handle her question. “Frontal and occipital lobe implants. They process the incoming digital signal and boost image analysis and reading comprehension.” 

Tone flat, he spoke so clinically, the answer rattled off like a blaster round. Even with the memories in her head, Rey couldn’t find the same dispassion in herself. She breathed with raw honesty, “That’s amazing.” 

“The death gang certainly thinks so, they specialize in cybernetic upgrades.” Pausing a moment, he whispered, “I never asked for mine.” 

For a brief second, she saw it again – and then, blackness. Heard the screams.  
Rey swallowed the bitter taste suddenly in her mouth.

She watched the rise of his arm, the twisting of his torso. Grabbing fistfuls of hair at the back of his head, he parted the strands between his fingers. Words were not needed. The length, along with the haphazard cut, hid the scars that forked like lightning, slim and jagged. Especially with the way the ‘fresher left his hair, glossy and clean, she wouldn’t have even known they were there. 

Opening her mouth, the reply caught in her throat. He’d bared the nape of his neck in the process, and the sharp lines of black ink summoned her gaze like a homing beacon. Concentric circles were overlaid with a few words, the sharp corners and dashes of the aurebesh contrasting strikingly with the smooth curves. What had Leia called it? _Something property designation_. Less familiar with the workings of the Galaxy, Rey wasn’t absolutely certain what that meant. But she could guess. 

Staring at the tattoo, her reply was too long in coming and he wasn’t stupid. Hux dropped the curtain of his hair, back stiffening as he resolutely went back to reading whatever he had up on the screen in his hands. 

Except he wasn’t. Rey could tell. 

It would have been a convincing act if Rey hadn’t just been examining him, the periodic micro movements and predictable pupil changes that meant he was actually reading. The two waited, praying the other would speak first, before he finally, very quietly, said, “I wasn’t exactly honest.”

Rey started at his words. A flicker of alarm, the first since she’d started spending time with him, wavered in her gut. “About what?”

“When you asked in the mess why the death gang took me from my home planet. They didn’t.” He slowly touched the back of his neck, gliding over dark lines hidden by his hair, and the alarm guttered out. “It’s a clan designation, indicates what slaving party took me and what…” He stopped for a moment, soon regaining his footing, “market I was sold in. The death gang were just the ones that bought me.” 

Rey nodded, her heart seizing in her chest despite her best efforts. If she hadn’t been in such a rush to get out of his head, she’d probably have seen that happen too. While it didn’t clarify _how_ he’d gotten there in the first place, a trip through the slave markets explained a few things – not least of all the messy ‘MALE’ scrawled above his brow. 

“I thought… _that_ ,” she motioned to her forehead, “was just in case you forgot.”

For a moment, his face was blank, as devoid of emotion as she’d ever seen it. 

And then, like a switch had flipped, he began to laugh. 

It creaked to life at first, rusty and disused, spilling from his lips and growing louder. Head back, shoulders shaking, it was the kind that made her wonder if he wasn’t expelling something more than sound into the air. It had been a terrible attempt at a joke, she reflected, but she found herself smiling and basking in the sound all the same. 

He had a good laugh. 

She wouldn’t mind hearing it again. 

\-----

The droid was a piece of garbage. 

How fitting, considering the man it was supposed to emulate. 

Cobbled together from three others, it was three different colors and had the barest hitch in its step where the right leg was a little shorter than the left. Despite this, however, it was strong and it was fast, and when the slim wooden staff about the length of her lightsaber contacted her own, the impact jangled the nerves from wrist to shoulder. 

She’d designed it expressly to be this way. 

What little she had learned from Luke in their brief time together about the different schools of saber tactics Rey had attempted to program into the droid’s protocol. It elaborated and embellished upon the basics as well as its learning capabilities allowed, and even after a year, a particularly brutal whirl and thrust could knock her flat on her ass. 

After spending time with Finn the night before, that was exactly the kind of thing she needed. 

_”So when are you going to tell him?” Finn threw down a card._

_Her only answer was to toss a competing one, the silence stretching out like the moment a ship jumped into hyperdrive._

_“Rey, you_ are _going to tell him, right?”_

_Keeping her tone as breezy as she dared, Rey tried to shrug it off. “I don’t really think it’s necessary. Thomas seems like a good guy.”_

_The inclusion of ‘seems like’ was almost just for show at this point, she reflected sheepishly. She’d seen inside his head, spent nearly every waking moment with him for a week, and whatever cruelty had been woven into the fabric of the General – well that had been burned away._

_The General was steel, tempered and finely honed. Thomas was clay, brittle and so easily broken._

_Finn wouldn’t understand._

_Hands sinking into his lap, cards fanned out and forgotten, Finn just looked at her. His disappointment scalded her worse than anger. “He needs to understand. He needs to appreciate what happened.”_

The worst part was that they had been having fun, playing a game of cards popular among the pilots and laughing as they used to. And then she’d gone and brought up Hux, a mere slip of her judgment, an offhand comment. Rey didn’t remember what about, and it wasn’t important – it hadn’t taken long for the argument to start. 

It also hadn’t taken long for it to end. 

Side-stepping a punishing chop, Rey sent the next strike glancing off to the side and pressed her own advantage at the opening in the droid’s defenses. Vicious, efficient – she drove the droid backwards, raining blow after barely blocked blow. Behind her, a quiet rush of breath reminded her of her audience. 

Lost in her thoughts and in the movements of her body, she’d forgotten he was even there. 

The droid spun away, putting an uncomfortable amount of distance between them. 

Sinking into a crouch, Rey waited. 

_Her gaze shot to Finn’s, brows drawing together. The card game lay forgotten before them, though she held her fanned cards steady like a shield. “I don’t see why it’s so important.”_

_“That he knows what he did? Who he killed? The magnitude of his actions?” Finn hadn’t raised his voice, but the earnestness and urgency riddling his tone rattled her far more than if he had. “If he’s as good a person as you say he is, he’ll feel remorse, he’ll feel grief. Hell, he’ll feel like Hux_ should _feel.”_

_“He should feel empathy, yes. And from what I’ve seen, I think he absolutely would.” She shook her head, adding heatedly, “But Thomas shouldn’t have to feel guilt for something he didn’t do.”_

_The reply deflated him, determination replaced with shock._

_“But… he did do it.”_

_Rey did what she did best – stood her ground. Teeth bit into her tongue, clamping down on the words threatening to spill. She’d tried to explain the differences to Finn before, but he was unwilling or unable to comprehend them._

_“You didn’t see them. The lights in the sky.” He swallowed. “I did.”_

The détente couldn’t last forever. 

The droid charged without warning, feinting left before striking to the right. She parried it, poorly, and the opening she left earned her a sharp blow to the ribs. Another gasp came from behind her, and she resisted the urge to glance to its source. The waves of concern had been so strong she’d had to strengthen her barriers earlier or risk distraction. Doubling, she skittered backward, thankful the sparring sabers were not plasma beams or she’d have a smoking hole for a lung. 

Readjusting her grip, Rey backtracked in defense, regaining her feet and breath. She finally spared a quick smile over her shoulder, enough to communicate that despite the smarting in her ribs, she was just fine. He hesitantly smiled back. 

The first time a blow had knocked her to the ground, Hux had leapt to her side from where he sat against the wall, as if the droid wasn’t advancing and on the offensive. Frightened, practically quaking, he’d still helped to haul her to her feet before she could tell him not to. At least he was refraining from interfering now – it was bad enough defending one body, much less two. 

Centering herself, Rey advanced quickly, her blade locking against the droid’s. 

_”I was… preoccupied at the time,” admitted Rey. Her words hardening, she tried to explain, tried to make him see. “But I’m not blind, Finn. I know what Hux did. I’m not forgiving him for that. I’m only saying that Thomas is not Hux and I don’t see the utility in telling him.”_

_And it was true, all of it; but it wasn’t complete. He was clay, fragile after the fires of the slave markets and the gang ship, and Rey didn’t want the burden of shattering him. The Resistance meant rescue, safety._

_Rey meant safety._

_Oblivious to her thoughts, Finn only leaned towards her, eyes wide and searching. “Yeah but don’t you think he has a right to know? Why do_ you _get to be the one who hides the truth from him?”_

_“Everyone else is too.” Rey could hope, even if she could hear her own lie._

_His scowl dashed the dream she’d woven for herself, his words grinding the glass shards into the ground. “Like Hell, Rey. When this gets around, and it will get around…” He trailed off, before looking her in the eye._

_“Doesn’t he have a right to know why they’re going to hate him?”_

A push with the Force sent the droid sprawling, and a certain level of pressure was enough to pin it there. It resisted wildly, thrashing against the floor so hard she feared it might snap the spindles of its arms. Granted the behavior was to be expected, as she’d programmed in recklessness and overrode the self-preservation protocols, given the berserker source material. While normally she neglected the Force in favor of training her saber prowess, she had to admit it was one hell of a way to end a fight. 

“End protocol.” 

The command stilled the droid’s movements, limbs falling limp. 

A voice piped up just behind her, concerned and unsure. “Had enough for today?” 

Stretching her arms overhead, Rey felt the dull ache where the droid had landed its blow. An hour was more than enough at the setting she’d set it to. “Of sparring, anyway. I think my ribs will thank me.”

“Are you going to be okay?” 

Twisting into the pain, Rey was surprised to see his hands slightly outstretched, fingers curled as if he’d reached for her and suddenly changed his mind. A pang of regret reverberated in her chest; if she’d known seeing her fight would upset him so, she wouldn’t have agreed to it. The droid wouldn’t _actually_ maim her… she didn’t think. 

“I’ll be fine,” she assured, “can’t learn saber without a few bumps and bruises.” 

He nodded solemnly, hands lowering to clench at his sides. Expression softening after a moment, he chuckled breathlessly, saying, “I don’t know how you thought that could be boring. It was riveting.”

“You should see me with a quarterstaff.” A faint grin tugged at her lips, a not insignificant amount of pride blooming in her chest. “Or my actual lightsaber.”

“Can I some time? I’ve never seen anyone use a lightsaber before.”

_Yes, you have._

The thought bubbled up, and sadness inexplicably rushed to fill in its wake. 

It was the kind of sadness that once it got its hooks into you, it wasn’t easy to banish. Hanging over her head for the rest of the day as they read, it followed into the next, only mellowing when she made good on her offer to talk tech in the privacy of his quarters. Not wanting to crowd him on the bed, she dragged her chair to rest against the coverlet and pulled up maps and images of Jakku on her holopad. She didn’t miss it, not exactly, but she couldn’t deny the far simpler, meaner time held a sort of nostalgia when viewed from the den of thorns she now found herself embroiled in. 

Or maybe it was the other way around – maybe it was relief that as complicated as things had gotten, at least she wasn’t back there.

He’d listened with rapt attention as she pointed out the Ridge and the Badlands and the Sinking Fields, explaining what each of the tents were for in Niima Outpost and who manned them. The countless varieties of sand, the colors and textures and grain size, the way it felt different beneath your feet depending on where you were. She took him through some of the famous wrecks, answering his questions and painting the specs in precise detail and thinking maybe someday, she’d take him through the cavernous ruins in her head. 

She’d trailed off during the description of a hyperdrive nacelle sunk half in the sand not far from her home, when he finally spoke up. 

“Do you ever want to go back to Jakku?” 

_Why does everybody want to go back to Jakku?_

“Absolutely not.” The reply was automatic and emotionless, despite the faint memory of Finn's indignation. Wondering if it was the right thing to be asking, she responded “Do you ever want to go back home?” 

Belatedly she realized she didn’t even know what planet his _home_ was. 

He shook his head. “There’s nothing left for me there.”

The wrinkles between his brows crinkling, he traced aimless patterns in the folds of the blanket, words slow and quiet. “You know I never even thought I’d get a chance to answer that question. I thought I was going to die on that ship. Starved or strangled or blown up with the rest of them. But even worse than dying, would be to spend the rest of my life like that.” 

Breath forced from her lungs, Rey found herself covering one of his hands with her own. He didn’t recoil from the touch and too late to take it back, she squeezed. “Now you won’t have to. Things are going to be okay.” 

Rey hoped to whoever was listening that was true. 

He smiled, soft and quiet in the way a whisper might be. “I know. Here, there’s a bed, and food whenever I want it, and, and,” he stuttered out, a flush creeping up his neck as his other hand gently folded over hers, “you’re very kind to me.”

Staring at their hands, his slim fingers almost entwined with her own, a thousand different replies blossomed on her tongue, only to meet their ends before they met air. Like the minutes after a duststorm, her tongue felt coated with sand, clumsy and dry and sticking to the roof of her mouth. She slowly pulled her hand away. 

Clicking off her holopad, revolving blue orb a reminder searing itself into her brain, she rose unsteadily to her feet. 

“I hope you sleep well.” 

His thoughts, ashamed and confused, dogged her footsteps out the door. 

\---

“I could be helpful.” 

Rey appraised him over the glowing screen of her datapad, held in the hollow of her crossed legs. Lying on his stomach next to her on the bed, he’d propped himself up on his elbows, datapad sandwiched between them. She didn’t envy the crick no doubt in his neck, but all things considered, it was probably the least of his problems. 

Other than flipping onto his back occasionally with the datapad held in the air, he hadn’t really moved. Encouragement to sit up hadn’t done much good; not twenty minutes later and the mattress would be shifting as he lied flat again. So much for Kalonia’s advice about keeping his head elevated for a few days until the swelling went down. 

If there was an upside to the situation –his assurances of _don’t worry, this isn’t the first time_ , sputtered and nasal, didn’t really count – it was that his nose wasn’t broken. 

She tilted her head, uncrossing her legs where they’d started to cramp. Shifting this way and that, she settled with bending them to the side, knees lightly brushing his shoulder. She’d lasted almost two weeks with the metal chair, but wasn’t able to last much longer. “Help with what?”

A timid shrug, as much as his position allowed, and he ventured, “With anything you needed. I’m good… very good with computers, or I can man the comms, or…”

Her look stopped him even before her words did. They petered out as an abashed expression claimed his face. She tried to keep her words gentle, but couldn’t disguise the steel underneath. “That’s a nice offer, but you know you can’t. General Organa won’t have you anywhere near the comms or databases.” 

He threaded a lock of hair behind his ear, careful not to touch his cheek. The bruising crested high on the bone, purpling beneath his eye and around his nose. “I’m already here though, I just figured I could at least help out. As a, a thank you.” 

“The General doesn’t think that would be appropriate.” As if she could guess what Leia did or did not think, having spent two weeks trying to meet with the woman only to have an aide-de-camp reluctantly inform her that she was too busy to be seen each time. 

If he’d wanted to argue – and for better or worse he was voicing his opinion more now – he kept it bottled inside, lip worrying between his teeth. Finally, his gaze fell back to his datapad. 

She tried to do the same. She failed. 

Re-reading the same two lines of text again and again, Rey couldn’t keep her thoughts from spiraling. If anything, yesterday’s little incident revealed how extraordinarily bad of an idea his was. _The General_ probably never got a right hook to the face, and if she hadn’t stopped it, he’d have certainly gotten more. 

And that was in the hallway, for kriffing sake. 

That’s all she would need really – someone taking his presence near the control room computers as evidence he was a spy and shooting him, Rey figured darkly. Or worse yet, as an excuse to do so. When she’d taken responsibility for his care, she’d written off such an event as the product of her paranoid mind. Lately, however, said paranoid thoughts seemed to be bleeding into reality. 

News of Hux had spread around the base like a poison through the bloodstream, borne on livid tongues in private quarters and the glowers of those who’d lost friends, lovers, _family_ – and things were getting harder, not easier. Before he’d attracted a strange look or two in the corridor on the way to the mess, a few stares once they were there. As irritating as she’d found it at the time, Rey would pay to return to that level of attention. 

After what happened the day before, she was honestly shocked he wanted to leave his room at all, much less plant himself in the middle of command control. 

It had taken hours for him to stop trembling, breath hitching every so often as memories dredged up in his head. Different rooms, different hallways, but the same violence, so far from the relative shelter of his sweltering hot server banks. For a cheap laugh, it hadn’t been worth it to fish around in the wires or brave the heat, he’d erratically explained, the motion nearly knocking askew whatever clot they’d managed to get to take hold. And it had taken hours for his nose to stop bleeding, recalling the stains on her other tunic as she’d carefully helped hold gauze to his face. To think, he’d been the one apologizing to _her_ – 

“I could speak with her.” 

The comment jolted her out of her reverie. It took her a second to remember who they’d been talking about. “ _Why?_ ”

“I know I’m a waste of resources here, and it looks to the others like I was a death gang member. Maybe if they see I can help, things might be better.” He closed his eyes for a moment, full lips rounding out as he let his breath out slowly. When they opened and he turned his head, they looked up at her with helpless sorrow. “Why hasn’t she told everyone I’m not… that I’m not _him_?” 

Her mouth opening, she saw it again. 

_“_ Hux! _Yeah, you, I’m talking to you.” A voice rang out, the dark-haired young woman, a pilot first-class by the insignia on her jacket, storming down the hallway. She was on them in no time._

_Hux stammered out something, that she had him mistaken. It cut off sharply._

_Her fist landed against his nose and cheekbone, and she was screaming a name Rey couldn’t remember, elbow chambering for another blow before Rey was moving, grabbing, pulling her off and away and to the floor._

Rey’s feet had moved like lead, her arms weighted down as blood pumped hard and fast in her ears. Her brain had stuttered to keep up, to process that a pilot had attacked him and she, in return, had attacked the pilot. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. 

And he didn’t even understand. He thought it was all a misunderstanding, something that could be cleared up with a few words. 

_They’re not going to stop hating you. For kriffing sake, you don’t even know why they hate you._

And whose fault was that? 

She’d told him it would be okay – then, perhaps, she hadn’t known better. She wanted to lie again, to feign ignorance, innocence. But the way he was looking at her, pitiful and trusting and sad, she couldn’t. Finn had been right. 

Rey raised her hammer, preparing to strike. She just hoped that when he shattered, whatever _this_ was, this understanding between them, didn’t shatter too. 

The world narrowed down to a point. 

“She hasn’t told everyone because you _were_ General Hux.” And then, as if it made it better, “I didn’t want to tell you.” 

__ 

The holo flickered out of existence, and with it went Kylo’s hope that this would be easy. The meeting hadn’t been the simplest of things to arrange, and he was hoping for something more than futility. 

Leaning back in his chair, the slaver lifted his hands in a sort of shrug. He was missing most of a finger, the index on his left hand nothing but a stump, and his Basic was heavily accented. Biologically human then, but certainly not raised that way – a man selling other men. Dregs of age-old disgust curled in the pit of his stomach at the reminder, only worsened by what followed, simple and blasé. 

“I cannot help you, I am sorry.”

He sounded anything but. 

Clenching his fist, Kylo struggled to keep his voice neutral, but it still came out as little more than a hiss. “Do you mean to tell me, Elak, that you might have a general of the First Order hiding in your quadrant and you don’t know about it?” 

Sandstone walls sloped overhead, their smooth curvature throwing his distorted voice back to his ears. He reached over to click the holopad back on. “Refresh your memory.” 

Whether trying once more or merely humoring him, the other man stared intently at the pale blue holo. His demeanor was otherwise unruffled, and though he was tempted to probe the other man’s mind, the Knight relented for the moment. Kylo kept his gaze resolutely from the image; he didn’t need it to haunt his dreams any more than it already did. Behind him, he could hear the clink of porcelain, the trickling of tea as the slave attendant poured distinctly two cups. 

A pathetic gesture. Hux would have considered it a waste of good tea.

After a moment, Elak sighed, running his damaged hand through graying hair. The movement revealed a notch missing from his ear, the marking of an agent of the Thalassian slave guilds. “Lord Ren, with all due respect, my response has not changed since you came to us two years ago. It has nothing to do with my memory.” 

“You will find that –” The filth sat heavy on his tongue, but for his General, he let the words drop from his mouth. They reeked of illicit business, of the world of _Han Solo_. “The First Order can pay.”

Elak waved the comment away like it was nothing, oblivious to how it had pained him to utter it. “It’s not a matter of additional payment. I have nothing to offer.” 

A steaming translucent cup was set on the desk before him, a pleasantry made all the more ridiculous by the presence of his mask and the knowledge of where he was. Slavers – they always played at civility, right up until the shackles clicked into place. He let it sit where the woman had left it. 

“I was under the impression that Chalcedon conducted much of the Mid-Rim’s flesh trade. I find it surprising that you would not have heard anything.” Allowing it to sink in for a moment, Kylo added, “When something is hidden from me, it doesn’t often stay that way.” 

Other men would have been cowering in fear at the implied threat, but other men would not have known how impotent it was. The Non-Aggression Pact with the guild bound his hands, and whatever leeway it left, his desire for secrecy effectively commandeered. Assaulting a guild agent, no matter how tempting, would prove politically and personally deleterious. 

It sounded like something Hux might have cautioned – _sternly_ , and with reason. A faint grin bloomed and died at the thought.

And unfortunately, Elak seemed all too aware of his limitations. Infuriatingly still, the man had been trained to block most of his mental broadcasting. 

The slaver’s head tilted, one finely shaped brow lifting in bemusement. “You make it sound like there was something to hear, Lord Ren.” 

Gritting his teeth, Kylo swore silently. It wasn’t quite showing his hand, but it still came kriffing too close to it. Between the two of them, Hux was the negotiator, the suave manipulator. Diplomacy and secrecy weren’t Kylo’s forte, weren’t even an area he claimed a shred of interest in, and it would not have surprised him to discover that were their situations reversed, Hux would have found him in a matter of days. 

The thought only made him feel worse. 

Still, Kylo worked with what he had, meager as it was. His only tactic was pretending to search on behalf of First Order High Command, who might reasonably be seeking its missing officer. Elak didn’t need to know that _that_ hunt had ended quite some time ago. 

His voice flat, a feature only accentuated by the distorter, he rejoined, “If there was, I can promise you the Order would not be wasting its time here. We make standard inquiries with our partners from time to time.” 

“Ah, well then. My answer is still sadly in the negative.” Elak grinned, more a baring of teeth than actual smile. Kylo half expected to see a sharpened crown or two. “But I suppose if that bit of business is concluded, we may talk of what caused you to request this meeting in the first place?”

Kylo twitched at the suggestion the rising lilt to the man’s voice implied. Elak enjoyed toying with people – their lives, their bodies, their minds, friends, enemies, or property, didn’t matter. 

But he had a part to play and a goal to consider, even if it meant playing the man’s games. 

“What have you to report?”

Elak, after tapping the side of the delicate teacup to check its temperature, brought it slowly to his lips. A soft stream of air skated over the tea surface. “We have identified new markets as sources of bodies for your Stormtrooper program. Thirteen in all. In conjunction with your ships, tapping of these markets has already begun and should reach peak performance within the next three months.” 

Feeling the seams of his patience wearing thin, threatening to tear asunder entirely if this meeting didn’t wrap soon, Kylo bit out, “Good.” 

“The focus on the fleet rather than singular pieces of technology seems to have greatly benefitted the war effort. Even despite the setback with that one trooper. Shame really,” commented Elak thoughtfully, taking a moment to sip his tea. “Shame that the general deserted before he could see how successful the program expansion has been.”

Kylo resolutely swallowed the acid of a reply, his throat burning raw from the bile. _Hux is no deserter._ But he’d had the same thought himself, hadn’t he? A vile whisper in the back of his mind. 

He refused to believe it. 

When the words clawed their way up his throat, their claws gouged into the soft flesh. “That allegation has not been proven.”

“Seems the most obvious conclusion though, no? After all, the Order has been unable to locate him. He has probably taken great pains not to be found.” The slaver shook his head, pity Kylo knew to be false riddling his expression. “Who can blame him really, after the Starkiller debacle?”

Kylo pushed back from his seat, rising to his full height and tamping down the urge to reach for his saber screaming inside his head. He couldn’t promise that his words wouldn’t devolve into throwing the man against the nearest wall; in fact, the outcome of this meeting might be a surprise to them both. “If you’ve taken to burdening me with your commentary, I assume you are finished.”

“Yes, yes. Inform your Leader everything is on schedule and capacity grows by the week.” Elak snapped his fingers at the woman leaning into the far wall. “You – escort Lord Ren back to his shuttle, then return to me.”

She nodded curtly and the slaver stood, inclining his head in a charade of a bow. “As always, a pleasure doing business with the Order.” 

Kylo didn’t deign to reply, lest the man lose his remaining fingers. Merely spun on his heel and followed the woman out the door. 

It had been a fool’s errand even coming here. 

But it had been one of the most obvious places to start, since the message hadn’t come through on a long range comm link. While the original source may have been scrambled, it never would have reached the Finalizer without a booster point along the way. That point so happened to be a station on Naboo, which steered possibilities to a Mid Rim or Outer Rim territory as its source. 

The irony was not lost upon him. 

Still, there were countless systems within that radius, and more than a few slaving enclaves. While it would have been preferable to avoid the one the Order did business with, he hadn’t had a choice. Given that the Hutts were less than predisposed to treat with him, Kylo instead found himself in a dimly lit corridor on Chalcedon, following the muted footsteps of the slave meant to ferry him through the complex. 

That was, until she abruptly stopped. 

And turned. 

She drew closer, the bob of her throat the only outward sign of the fear – and rage, a defiant rage he knew well – that coiled in the pit of her gut and buffeted his senses. She kept her voice low, barely above a murmur. “I know something that might interest you, Lord Ren. I was… attending the Master and I overheard a conversation.” 

He’d already been disappointed, his General ridiculed and slandered, and it was testing what little self-control he possessed not to leave a smoking furrow in the corridor wall. His words were clipped. “What conversation?” 

“Nothing’s for free.” 

_Of course. Disgusting._ “How much?”

“Credits? No.” Her hood pooled around the base of her neck, catching the haphazard tumble of dark waves of hair. The jagged edges swayed as she sharply shook her head. “I’m not interested in freedom. I want your blaster.” 

Well, this was slightly more interesting – and, he found himself thinking, more understandable. "To do what?"

"Does it matter?" Her words cut quick. 

"No.” He replied simply, honestly. And then, just as truthfully, “I don't carry one." 

Kylo glimpsed the momentary tightening of her eyes, the deepening of her frown. A sun-blanched scar dragged down one corner of her mouth naturally. "Well then, my Lord. Let's be on our way." 

She turned as swiftly as she had stopped, padding away from his still form. 

Kylo could take it, burrow into her mind and retrieve the probably useless information and leave her a sobbing mess on the floor. Could and, for Hux, would. He reached out to her retreating back, fingers splayed with the intent to halt her feet, but his breath suddenly snagged on the sharp edge of a single thought. He need look no farther than the tips of his fingers. 

The blood of slaves ran within his veins as sure as they ran within hers, within Anakin Skywalker’s. 

His fist closed, arm lowered. Through the distorter, his voice was expressionless, but it stilled her retreating steps. "I can get you a blaster." 

Returning cautiously to face him, she side-eyed him for a long moment. He could see the very second she made her decision, resignation flooding between them with the hope that he would keep his side of the bargain. She kept her voice down. "This was about a year ago – “

A spike of irritation lanced through him. "Why would I pay for old information?"

"It's _information_ ,” she insisted, sharp-eyed and almost fever-bright. “You wouldn't be here if you weren't desperate. The fact that you are back at all, after two years, means you have a lead. But not a good one. So you’ll pay.”

Kylo stayed silent, refusing to acknowledge her perceptiveness. She took it as agreement. 

“A year ago, one of the traders requested more funds. He’d chartered a ship and he wanted to acquire a slave from whoever he was riding with. Now,” she brushed non-existent dust from the front of her robe, “I don’t speak Thalassian very well, so I don’t even know if this was a man. All I know is the trader wanted them for the hair,” she grabbed a lock of hers, “Beautiful, he said. Brightly colored. Red, I think." 

“You think.” Kylo seethed, unable to decide if the story’s vagueness or specificity where it counted bothered him more. "I fail to see why that would matter." 

"It’s unusual outside of the Core, and rare things fetch a high price. The trader seemed to think he'd make a good pleasure slave – I do know that word.” Her voice darkened, eyes hardening. “Even when he saw the mutilations." 

Kylo fought to keep the world from tilting. This couldn’t be Hux. But he felt the ripples in the world around him, and suddenly, couldn’t breathe. 

He beat it down, blindly seeking quiet, focus, in the roaring in his ears. 

"Mutilations?" 

Oblivious to his thoughts, she gestured absently. "I’m pretty sure he used the word _defaced_. I don’t know if he meant like a work of art or… more literally. Some clients don’t mind as long as the important bits are there – anyway, the thing that stuck out to me is the trader wanted to offer a lot of credits, and I mean _a lot_ , but Elak wouldn’t approve it and the owners wouldn't sell. That almost never happens around here.”

She glanced downwards, before steeling herself to look him in the eye. Or what passed for his eyes behind the mask anyway. “And that's all I got." 

"So.” The word blasted out on a wave of impatient frustration. It masked the horror bubbling just underneath. “A maybe red-haired, maybe mutilated slave, who was last seen, second-hand, a year ago." 

"Yes.” She shrugged. “But like I said, a _valuable_ slave." 

It was nebulous – rationally _at best_ it was nebulous. But the Force did not bow to what the human mind thought rational and it was the one thing of value the planet had had to offer. Besides, her asking price was hardly the stuff of legends. With any luck, she’d shoot Elak, and as the two approached a guard standing solemn vigil near the exit, Kylo fervently hoped she would. No doubt the guild would execute her summarily for it, but that was her choice to make. 

Something good might come of his visit after all. 

He raised his hand, lacing his words with the sickly sweet compulsion of the Force. A blaster might not be part of his usual apparel, but it was child’s play to obtain one. 

“You will surrender your weapon, and if anyone asks, you will say you lost it.” 

The guard parroted back his instructions, mechanically offering the blaster with all three of his arms. Barely a second passed before it delved beneath her robes, tucked out of sight and hidden beneath the bulky fabric. As if she hadn’t just broken what he could imagine to be a cardinal rule of guild property, she sauntered to the console controlling the door to the shuttle bay. 

Now that payment was complete, there was one last vital piece of information he needed to know. 

"Who were the owners?" 

She glanced over her shoulder, before turning back to the console. "I don't know. But it sounded like a death gang reaper ship." Tapping in the code, she smirked as the large panels retracted to reveal the hulking figure of his shuttle halfway down the bay. “Does it matter though? You know what those ships are like. Probably dead by now anyway.”

Kylo didn’t even spare her a glance as he stormed towards his shuttle. She had her blaster, she could keep her comments. 

Still, a thought, wistful and cruel and not one of his, floated to lodge itself in his brain. 

_Pity, if his hair was as pretty as the trader said._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kylo should close in soon. 
> 
> Come talk to me! I'm somethingstately on Tumblr.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has read, kudos'ed, and commented! I apologize that it has taken me so long. Hopefully it's worth the wait! 
> 
> Come talk to me at [ somethingstately](http://somethingstately.tumblr.com/)

_“She hasn’t told everyone because you_ were _General Hux.” And then, as if it made it better, “I didn’t want to tell you.”_

For a moment, nothing happened. Then life stirred to movement.

He flipped onto his side, the lines of his countenance smoothing into shocked blankness, the dying ripples on a lake’s surface after a stone breached the surface.

"That's not funny." Soft, almost rusted, she could hear the hitch in his voice.

"It's not a joke. It's the truth."

She stared at her feet, tucked to her side, rather than meet the unearthly stare fishing for her own.

Out of the corner of her eye she watched as his mouth opened, smoothness gone as his face finally screwed up in confusion.

"It can't be."

"I’m sorry.” And then, “It is.”

She leveled the statement like a lightsaber swing, knowing and aching inside with how the words would burn. These didn’t cauterize cleanly like the calling card of her weapon; they seared, jagged and blistering. His thoughts jerked in response, confusion and panic working their way upwards like gas in a mine shaft. She slammed her barriers into place, fortified and high enough to rebuff the explosion that was no doubt coming. If he was going to break, she couldn’t break with him.

The silence in her head, mirroring that which stretched between the two of them, was deafening. She was grateful when he shattered it.

"But I remember. I remember my _life_." He paused, pushing himself to a sitting position, rattling off a mantra, a testament, "My name is Thomas Ardellian. I was born on Siskeen. I'm 30 years old. I managed the flights at a spaceport –"

It smacked of practice.

Who knew how many times he had rehearsed it, combing through his thoughts the past two years and finding discrepancy after discrepancy, clinging to what he _did_ know. Grimacing, Rey schooled her expression and asked flatly, "If you're from Siskeen why do you have a Corellian last name? That's on the other end of the Galaxy."

"Because. Because,” he glanced around, eyes begging helplessly for her to make sense of it, to explain away the inconsistency, “Because my family must have come from there at some point."

“Okay then. Fine.” Rey took a breath. “What was your address on Siskeen?”

“I don’t remember that.” Breath speeding up, she watched the rise and fall of his narrow chest, the black bringing out the ugly tones of the bruise on his face, the faded ones on his neck. “I’ve _tried_ , but it was a long time ago, I –”

“Okay, what district? What city then?” She leaned closer, even the tiny spread of her shoulders enough to crowd him. “What was your best friend’s name?”

“I, I don’t remember.” He sounded lost. “And I didn’t have any friends.”

“Well,” Rey conceded after a moment, “that might be true.”

Being friends tended to require willingly exposing a few chinks in the armor, safe in the knowledge that a knife wasn’t about to land home in the gaps. From what she had heard, the General hadn’t seemed the type to do or be either.  Still, she shook her head, calling to mind the file she’d pored over endlessly in the days after Thomas had been brought on base.

The words had burned on the backs of her eyelids night after sleepless night, an incongruent label she’d vainly tried to get to stick above the man at her side. Charred and black, now they almost made her gag. “You are Brendol Hux Jr. Born on Arkhanis, raised in the Unknown Regions –”

Standing abruptly, he pushed away from the bed.  Agitated, his movements were jerky, uncoordinated. Uncaring of the bruising, he rubbed at his eyes, enflamed red lapping at the blue and purple mottling his cheek. She wanted to tell him to stop, to catch his hands and tear them away from his face, but she forced herself to remain seated. If she was going to levy this pronouncement, she couldn’t equivocate, couldn’t leave him holding onto a shred of false hope that would only fester and warp over time.

Her words marched on.

“– aged 35 regulation-years. Promoted to the rank of General at 31. Son of Commandant –“

“But you went into my _head_.” He wouldn’t face her, wouldn’t look at her. “You said if I let you in and didn't fight you, you could prove it. Didn't you see?"

It stung, having her reassurances thrown back in her face.  Word for word, twisted back on themselves beyond what he never could have known she didn’t mean.

Force be damned, this was not how she wanted this to go. But how exactly had she thought it would go? He’d accept her news on the first pass, a small shrug his only response to the life-altering revelation? No. And subtlety wouldn’t do either of them any favors, nor would burying the truth in the sand now that the whole base knew. This was for the good of all involved. She clung to that thought, draining every last ounce of callousness it could provide.

"I did see. And I’m sorry,” and in a terrifying bolt of clarity, she realized she meant it, “But those memories aren't real."

He whirled on her, fists vibrating at his sides as swallowed emotion rattled his voice. It tremored as he struggled not to cry. "I'm not Hux."

The urge to agree with him sprung first to the tip of her tongue, the speed almost frightening if she had time or the desire to process it. Instead, she forced it back, settling for the no less truthful, "Maybe not now."

“I don’t understand.” Clenching his hands, knuckles paling from how tightly, his gaze fell to them before he fixed it once more on her. “How can you just say they're fake? How would you know?"

Rey waved vaguely in the air, mind stuttering over how to describe the indescribable. Without seeing it firsthand, it was almost impossible to relay. Still, she tried, venturing, "False memories have this hazy sort of glow around them. You wouldn't know unless you knew what you were looking for, and Luke taught me what to look for."

It was one of the few things he’d conveyed his full knowledge of; ironic given that he hadn’t had much to start with.

Reaching for her own holopad, Rey sent a wordless prayer to the Universe winging upward. Maybe she should have lead with this, but it had seemed much crueler an opening, so clinical and impersonal. Enabling the projection feature, a few clicks were all it took to summon his image, younger and harder than the face gazing back at her now.  

“See?”

The word was barely more than a whisper.   

The blue of the holo reflecting eerily in his dark eyes, he stared at it for a long while. Silent and transfixed. A few minutes passed, elongated and suspended like the star-streak right before a jump, until the blue began to waver with the welling of tears, suspended and glittering in each kyber crystal drop. Even with the damage, only somewhat healed, they began to pool.

And after another moment, the dam broke. Tears slipped down his cheeks.

Rey felt her heart seize, watching the man that should have been her enemy shatter in front of her.

“This can’t be true.”

“It is.”

“I’ve never killed anyone.”

Barely choked out, it twisted into her.  "Yes…. and no."

A sob tore its way out, broken and empty and so very quiet for all its distress. He clawed at his eyes, each tear he swiped away replaced by a flood of more. She patted the bed next to her, but he didn’t move.

"Listen, I know it's hard to process. And I'm not saying the memories aren't real to you. They definitely are. They just... aren't what happened to everyone else."

She winced, unable to stop herself – what a way to explain Starkiller. Definitely one for the history books, she figured, but what in the Maker’s name was she supposed to say? _I realize you are upset and shutting down, so let’s talk about the deaths of a trillion individuals by your hand in greater detail, hmm?_

Starkiller happened to everyone else, it was.

“Please come sit.” Sighing, Rey retracted her hand from its position, hovering over the bed, and brought it non-threateningly into her lap. He stood there, crumpling in on himself and gripping the bottom of his shirt. “I want you to.”

She let the plea hang in the air.

Finally, feet sluggish, he sank onto the bed. Rey let out a breath she hadn’t known she was holding, carefully sidling next to him. As a scavenger she hadn’t had abundant use for language beyond haggling, and the desert had never taught her how to soothe. The words she managed to summon felt heavy, sloppy on her tongue.

“I’m not saying you aren’t real. You are. The last two years are yours. Totally and completely yours.”

“Oh _wonderful_ ,” he sputtered, and up this close she could see the mess he’d made of his eyes again, inflammation competing with the black smear of bruise for most unsightly. His shoulders shook, trembling that vibrated through the thin line of his body.

Not wanting him to bolt, Rey hesitantly put an arm around his shoulders, pulling him closer into her side. Feeling his heat, the gentle quaking, a small corner of her mind had to marvel at the situation. Before this started, she wouldn’t have thought she’d be genuinely trying to comfort General Hux for well, _being General Hux._

His jaw jutted against the clean line of his cheek, clenched and grinding as stray tears slipped down over the soft curve.

A long slow breath left her mouth. “I understand better than anyone. Remember how I told you I was mind wiped as a child?”

She paused, waiting for him to nod, or do anything really. He didn’t. She lurched on regardless. “I have false memories too, and they make up a part of me. It is what it is.”

“So what am I supposed to do?”

Rey blinked. She hadn’t anticipated him asking. "Nothing. There's nothing to be done, at least not as things stand right now. You _were_ Hux, now, I guess, you're Thomas.  I just wanted to explain why... why the other day happened the way it did. And why people might try again." Her voice hardened. "But I won't let it happen."

Peeling himself from her side, his head whipped to face her. His mouth worked furiously. "And you knew this whole time?"

"Yes."

He glanced away, fists tightening into the fabric of his shirt. He curled inward, curtain of hair falling to shield his face. "And you've just been what, _pretending_? Pretending to be nice to me because you had to?"

The surge of indignation shocked even her, barreling into the open before she could tamp it down. "No one here could give a bantha’s ass how I treated you as long as I kept you alive. So no, no one's forced me to be nice to you and I haven’t been pretending. I wanted to get to know you. I wanted – "

The rest stoppered her throat.

_To understand. To make sure we were doing the right thing. To make up for ever finding you and dragging you back here._

She helplessly waved her hand, unable to explain.

The silence yawned between them, seconds stretching into minutes after her outburst. She felt her irritation soften by degrees, taking in the way he kept his face turned from her, almost resting in his hands.

Finally, he asked, so quiet and unsure, "What's going to happen to me?"

"Nothing. You'll stay here. Leia agrees with me that you're in no shape to stand trial."

She watched in profile as he mouthed the words, blood almost draining from his face. _Stand trial_. "Oh gods."

Jerking, arms gripping his stomach, Rey feared for a moment he was about to heave. Hurtling from the bed faster than she’d expected, Hux almost lost his footing, breath as rapid and loud as the desert creatures’ she would sometimes corral into the dead end of an engine port. The panic, thick and heavy on the hot stale air, franticly searching for a way out – there wasn’t a way out. 

He paced, arms twitching where he still hugged himself.  “Is there a way to undo it? Will they make me undo it?" Sobs wracked his frame anew. He paused, swiveling to face her and lancing her with his stare. He choked out, "I don't want to die."

A sharp injection of dread made her blood run cold.

She hadn’t considered the notion of reversing anything; Luke hadn’t even known if it was possible, if there was anything left to reverse _to_.

Wetting her lips, Rey breathed out, "I don't know. I don't think so."

Her feet finding the floor, she rose and carefully approached him, hands up. They curled over the bony rise of his shoulders, her arms locked at the elbow to keep him at bay.  Still he didn’t seem to have heard her, words flitting uselessly through his brain as her touch barely scratched the surface of the shroud of his panic.

His breath came faster, hysteria riddling his words and forcing them higher. "What would even _happen_? Would I just cease to exist – erased, nothing of me left? Would I even remember any of this? Would I remember _you_?"

With a jolt, she realized that he wasn’t talking about the war crimes trial, and the likely death that would come on its heels. No this was something more intimate and complex and simple than anything - the core of himself, the loss of or tampering with the identity that had been, for all intents and purposes, the only self he had ever known.

General Brendol Hux had already died that death. Only no one mourned him.

She'd mourn Thomas if it came to it.

Traitorously, and for the first time the idea crystallized into fact, Rey hoped it never would. She felt queasy at the thought; the idea of looking into those eyes, hard and cruel, the line of that mouth turned down into a pitiless sneer right before the firing squad delivered.

The truth stared her in the face – Rey was compromised. Rey was _fucked_.

Before she could think, stifle and second-guess the movement, she stepped closer and slid her arms under his. They wrapped around his back, palms bracing against the embossed knobs of his spine.

He hugged back just as tightly, pushing his face against the top of her head.

"I don't know,” Rey whispered. “I don’t know.”

His tears were wet on her hair.

\--------

 

Clouds of smoke, dense and choking, hung suspended over the scuffed metal bar. Individual wisps broke faith with the pinpricks of light at the end of each cigarra, rising upwards to mingle with the hundred scents drifting overhead. Light percolated through the smoke, hazy and undefined. Dimly lit to begin with, the haze only helped matters.

The less one saw in a place like this the better for everyone involved.

A tiny glass rested by his hand. Small as a Rutian hummingbird, the black liquid, still warm, kissed the edge. He took a sip, any more enough to make a man choke, and spared a single glance at the company he’d chosen.

Small clusters of two and three kept to themselves, hunched over cards or glowing dejarik tables, low rumbles of conversation drifting to meld with the smoke. Barely concealed currents of hostility snapped agitatedly between individuals, between tables, twitching and jerking with the emotions of their owners.

No sign yet of the reason he was in the bar to begin with.

If he'd thought it difficult to arrange a meeting with the slavers, two-faced partners of the First Order as they were, convincing the death gang to talk would be impossible. They spent half the time running cargo past Order embargoes, and the other half investing in the trade of arms to whoever would pay, insurgents and allies alike. The slavers might charter them for rides from time to time, but that was a complicated situation the Order willfully stayed out of. Better not to ask questions, seemed to be the thinking; when one reached blindly into the cesspool, one would rather not know what touched what.

He couldn’t meet them – not as Kylo Ren. A nameless smuggler, hidden under several aliases could, however. 

Luckily enough a name or two, old contacts half-remembered from an old life, still checked out, and hadn’t quite permanently _checked out_ as he’d dreaded. A suggestion here, a whisper there, and he’d managed to string it together in a little over a couple weeks. Amazing what mountains enough credits could move.

So, mask off in public for the first time in years, he sat in a dingy bar.

He’d taken Hux to a bar like this – ages ago, on a planet whose name he couldn’t recall. A rare stint of shore-leave for the not yet famous Colonel; rare because Hux never took it, not because he was never offered. Steel seemingly girding each muscle, Hux had perched straight and stiff at the edge of a bar stool, the perfect foil to the slumped and swaying bodies occupying the others. Something had put him off, possibly the seediness, the way everything seemed to be wet or sticky or both. But discomfort wasn’t the same as distaste, and it hadn’t been the latter etched into his grimace or floating on the top of his thoughts. Kylo had had a feeling it was the unpredictability, removed from the tightly controlled environment of an Order ship, the prickling and unsettling fear of not knowing which drunk would spin the roulette of poor decisions and drag him into the fray.

Either way, Kylo observed with no lack of amusement as a shot of Corellian whiskey, and then another, and another, disappeared down his throat, the staunch line of his back bowing under the weight of the alcohol.  He’d even run an unknowing hand through his hair, red strands pulled from their slicked back prison to skew oddly against his forehead.

Hux hadn’t imbibed often – for that matter, neither did Kylo. But Kylo had a thread tied to his ring finger, a line stretching into the slightly blurring past that grounded him, gave him a quick exit strategy if danger meant he had to leave his cups and come up for air.

Hux had no such recourse.

When the whiskey had said its piece, whispered into Hux’s ear with a soft hand at the small of his back, Kylo had slipped an arm around him. He’d been yielding, deceptively pliant, and if Kylo hadn’t known Hux would rather aim his blaster at his own foot than reveal the extent of his fondness in public, he might have said Hux leaned into him.

Still, he hadn’t complained when one of Kylo’s hands, free of its glove, had started at his knee and slowly crept upward. Squeezing and releasing, digging into the dark grey fabric of Hux’s civilian clothes, desperate for the heat that only burned hotter as he climbed. It radiated through the cloth and into his fingertips, stoking the heat stirring low in his gut.

He’d made it halfway up Hux’s thigh before a hand covered his own, not throwing him off but enough to pin him in place. His hand had continued upward anyway, fighting for each glorious centimeter as Hux’s breath had come quick, then quicker.

Grimacing at the memory, Kylo reached for his drink. He wouldn’t be the first man to wallow in the memories of an old love, and as long as there were smugglers and gangsters, he wouldn’t be the last. And honestly, if he wasn’t seemingly on the road to being drunk in a place like this, the charade was never going to hold. First his tongue and then his gag reflex protested at what might have been oil meant for the hyperdrive nacelle, thick and heavy and scorching white-hot. He forced himself to swallow and then to keep it down.

He shifted on the uncomfortable seat, lopsided slightly to the left. His knees bumped against the wall of the bar, legs entirely too long for the small space afforded them.

It hadn’t been their first kiss.

Kylo had pressed his mouth to Hux’s before he could really think, chapped, bitten lips covering soft, pristine ones in a familiar gesture. Close-mouthed at first, he’d parted his lips after a moment, feeling Hux respond with the barest of lags.

Hux had pulled away.

Pulled away, only to summon the bartender, offer his signature, and jerk his head towards the door.

They’d barely made it back to his shuttle, boots and gloves flung at first opportunity. Trousers had followed shortly after, kiss broken long enough to push them over thighs, calves, to the floor. They crumpled, and were stepped over, Kylo’s arms winding around Hux’s waist and pulling him flush against the hard length still trapped in his underclothes. He’d rubbed, fitted their hips together as he’d walked, progress halted when Hux’s back hit the shuttle wall. They’d broken apart for a moment then, Kylo hastily grabbing the lube he kept in the drawer by his cot, and slammed together once more.

They’d kissed often, wedged into the small space afforded by a hallway buttress as Kylo deterred any passing crew. They’d rubbed, and sucked, more times that he could count in the half-dimmed light of one of their quarters. Discretized and relegated to the press of flesh, the wet suck of reddened lips, it was easier to lie, to deny any sort of feeling beyond a vague satisfaction and contentment.   

Understandable, easily digested and processed.

But all of that hadn’t prepared him for the wet, squeezing heat, taking his fingers one by one as Hux hissed for _please more yes,_ lube squeezing out to run over his palm. Withdrawing his fingers, Kylo had lined them up, greedily watching as Hux closed on nothing, stretched and leaking. The image had burned into his mind, along with the broken moan, pulled from full lips and a soft face half-turned towards him. Hux had tried to keep eye-contact as Kylo had slowly pushed in, but his lashes had slammed shut as Kylo sank to the hilt.

The next few minutes had been a blur of heat and wet and movement, sliding and thrusting and building the crescendo that finally crystallized and peaked, in the warm rush of come where his hand wrapped around Hux’s cock, in his hips jerking against Hux’s ass as he came. And when he’d stuttered and slowed, the added slick smoothing his way for one last slow, languorous draw of his hips, Kylo felt the world shifting around him, threads catching under his skin to weave around the slowly bobbing throat of the man he still pinned.

Their breath had slowed together, he remembered. The rise of Hux’s back flush with his own.

He’d lied awake at night over the years replaying the feeling over and over again in his mind, enjoyed a hundred times, a thousand times, since that first moment. There were plenty of times, but the rush and the tightness of the first replayed until it was nearly threadbare. Nearly overlaid and overwritten with later interpretations and embellishments, times blending together.

Thinking about it now didn’t even arouse him as it once did, when he need only turn his head to see Hux, sprawled and lightly snoring at his side. Kylo closed his eyes, willing away the memory. If he didn’t, he was going to give into the barely concealed panic that it, and all the times after it, were now only that – memories. Dust motes on the cosmic sea.                       

A man leaned onto the stool next to him.

Kylo almost twitched, but at the last second managed to parley it into a move for his drink. Fingers seizing, already summoning the Force to line his words and helpfully convince whoever had decided to sit down to keep moving, Kylo glanced over the rise of his shoulder.

The Force dissipated from his grasp. He knew that jacket.  

“Wasn’t sure you were going to make it.” Kylo kept his voice gruff, plumbing the depths of his lowest register. Instinct screamed at him to straighten, to draw himself up to his full height and threaten, but that wasn’t the game he was playing here. _He_ was the one at a disadvantage. 

Eyes still scanning the crowd, the reply was non-committal, all too casual. “A mutual friend suggested I hear you out. And I could really use a fucking drink.”

That sounded about right. “I’m looking for a certain man. Property of yours.”  

Content with his read of the room, the man scoffed, finally falling onto the seat and flagging down the barkeep with one raised hand. A step above unkempt, his close-cropped beard was patchy, large eyes perpetually crazed looking. "So are a lot of people. You're going to have to be more specific."

Kylo waited as the other man – Tik? Something to that effect – put in an order for a Dantooine wheat ale, leaning over the bar towards the six-limbed barkeep like he was sharing some grand secret.

When the bartender was sufficiently out of earshot, order taken, Kylo elaborated further, “I'm not sure of the name he'd be using, if any. By this point, he’d have been in your possession for over a year.” The words stuck in his throat, but he forced them out. “He’s a human male. Thin, with red hair.”

Tik shrugged, accepting the proffered glass of ale and drawing deeply from it. He smacked his lips when he was finished, as if he’d tasted wares from the Emperor’s personal cellar and not the watered down piss a place like this served. "Can't help you with that sort of description. How am I supposed to remember a face among hundreds of slaves?"

Hux _had_ sampled the Emperor’s private wine reserve, squirreled away after the war, and to think of him, educated and sophisticated, under the boot of a man like _this –_

Kylo grabbed the man by the collar, rage clouding his vision. All thoughts of disadvantages evaporated under its heat. No one else, if they were even paying attention and to be honest they probably weren’t, batted an eye. "You would remember this one. It is quite famous."

To his credit, his _only_ credit, Tik remained unfazed despite the hands wrenching into the fabric of his lapels. Finally a brow quirked upward, and a sickening sort of understanding pooled in his eyes. His grin, hard and cruel, spread wide, as he glanced from hands to face. "So you're out for blood."

Kylo didn’t respond. Hux used to say a man would hang himself with his own assumptions.

"Your family on Hosnian Prime? Or Chandrilla?"

A relief, almost liquid and just as slippery hot, coursed through his veins. How ironic – the only amount of help in three decades his family ever offered, and it was to fool a death gang member. He released him, hands retreating to the bar. "Hosnian Prime."

"Condolences. Some of the boys had family there too." Tik took a swig from his drink as if he hadn’t just been threatened, wiping off the dribble of foaming head with the back of his hand. The smile twisted, calcifying into something even uglier. "You'll be happy to know we took care of him for you.”

_No._

The relief slinging through his veins froze at the comment, delivered with a certain level of relish that had fingers of ice forking up his spine. He knew Hux wasn’t dead – the message had said so, and he clung to that. But there were so many things that were worse than death. His thoughts skittered back to the slave, her nonchalant use of _defaced_ , ricocheting around the walls of his head and escaping his frantic hands.

"I doubt anything you could dream up could match what I'm looking to do." Kylo couldn’t say what pit the words clawed themselves from, but they were out of his mouth before he could think, low and quivering with what might have looked like psychotic fury.

Kylo knew it was cold-sweat panic.

Tik only cracked his neck, pride shining through. "You'd be surprised."

"Tell me."

"Took his eyes for one."

The mirror lining the wall behind the bar began to crack. Fissures splintering in the glass like the filigree of a spice worm’s web, the barman looked over at the damage, passive surprise briefly flitting over his face. Tik didn’t even seem to notice. He merely took another mouthful of his beer, as Kylo struggled in some corner of his mind to gather up every memory, every shard, of those eyes meeting his own.

 _Mutilations_.

His mind blurred white. Kylo hissed, "He is _blind_?"

Tik only tilted his head, round eyes scanning across Kylo’s pulled features. “And if he is?”

“I want him to see my face.” _Stars above did he ever want that_.

Whatever Tik saw in his expression seemed to mollify him, because he went back to considering his own drink, the dregs of his smile curling the corner of his mouth. "You may get your chance yet. Had to make good on the investment, he wasn’t cheap."

 _Get his chance._ So he wasn’t blinded then, at least not completely. The answer had been vague, but the gang’s obsession with cybernetics left open a few possibilities. From what he’d seen, which granted had not been much, the upgrades tended to leave their owners… _defaced_ , indeed.

Weeks ago he’d struggled to envision those eyes, drawing a blank on precisely what blend of green they were. Now he’d never know. 

Tik shrugged, adding, “He ended up being useful in his own way.”

Kylo burned to ask _useful_ _how_ , the question ready to throw itself off the precipice of his tongue. He bit it back. Fear gripped him – of what he might hear, of how many would lie in the smoking ruin of the bar once he knew. Their lives meant nothing to him, of course, but he tended to leave a particular calling card, and news of such wrath would make its way back to the Order.

Kylo had forgotten about the vile drink perched next to his hand. Desperate for the distraction, he gripped it between his thumb and index, taking a bigger swallow than he meant to. His throat stung, the fumes rising to sear his nose.

"Where did you find him?"

"Chalcedon. Don't know how Elak fucking got ahold of him but he did. Bastard came through for us big time."

Kylo's breath stopped, time seemingly slowing to a crawl. His mouth opened, the question coalescing – but he shut it, teeth clicking with the force of it. He wasn’t supposed to know Elak.

Elak, who was probably dead.

Elak, who had probably been shot with a stolen blaster, held in the hands of a slave. Either it was some horrible coincidence or the Universe was laughing at him, finally taking its pound of flesh from his blackened heart for every heart his saber had blackened. If Elak had had Hux, the truth was staring him in the face. Blood pounded in his ears, pounded like his fists ache to.

He cast his gaze elsewhere, anywhere else. It snagged on the cracks in the mirror. "What happened to our friend?"

Tik tossed back what was left of his beer, the thick reinforced glass slamming onto the bar. Baring his teeth, no longer a smile, he snarled, "Ask the fucking Resistance. They boarded that ship almost two months ago. "

The rush in his ears intensified, drowning out most of his thoughts. It took all he had to keep his feet planted, his shoulders hunched, anything but give in to the deafening demand to hunt, to _move_.

The message had come from _inside_ the Resistance. The Resistance who could be anywhere. The Resistance where that scavenger, where his _mother_ –

Somehow, the words grated out. "I’ll come for them."

Tik only barked out a laugh, or something that might have been one if it wasn’t reeking of spite, knife-sharp. "Mate, you want to go after him on some suicide run, be my guest. He was fun while it lasted but, trust me, the bastard isn’t worth it. There’s nothing of him left. You think he remembers Hosnian Prime? He doesn't even know his own _name_. And with that –"

Extricating himself from the stool, Tik clapped him on the shoulder. Kylo barely felt it; he didn't feel anything. 

“Thanks for the drink.”

 

\--------

 

Rey hadn’t known how long they’d stood there, too focused on the sloshing in her stomach and the palpitations of her heart. The way if she concentrated she could feel his own, beating against her cheek in a rhythm she knew too well. But his quiet sobs had quieted further into nothing and he’d pulled away eventually, arms retreating once more around himself.

He’d asked if he could be alone for a couple of days.

_Is that alright?_

_Of course._

_I’m sorry._

_Don’t be._

Each morning and night she brought him meals from the mess, an empty tray traded through a half-cracked door for a fully laden one. She found herself holding up the line each time, care put into finding something he might especially like, if only maybe to see the flash of an ashen grin during the exchange.

It never came, and he never even looked away from the floor.

Two days stretched into four.

Rey tried to busy herself with other things, mind never truly entirely on the task at hand. After spending weeks by his side, his absence was unsettling, disorienting. She meditated, she trained, throwing herself entirely into skirmishes with the droid. Even spent and panting, bent double and riddled with bruises, she half-expected to glimpse a flash of red over her shoulder. The sideline was empty every time she gave into the temptation to look.  

She’d sought out Finn, who’d been mollified, grimly pleased but courteous enough to hide it, by her confession. He’d suggested she inform Leia; Rey hadn’t, despite venturing to the General’s office several times, only to turn heel at the last second. _You did the right thing_ , he’d said. _It’s for the best._

For who, she didn’t know, but Rey hoped he was right.

At night the nightmares returned. Rey had awoken each time, thrashing and soaked in sweat, her palms curled protectively over her eyes. Leia’s tiny mirror had again made an appearance on her bedside table, reflecting bleary eyes pained by too little sleep and too much feeling.

Four days stretched into five, six, seven.

On the eighth evening, she’d knocked and opened the door as usual, expecting him to catch it halfway with an empty tray in hand. This time, however, it swung open freely. She cautiously entered, gripping the tray like a lifeline, hoping it meant what she thought it meant.

Hux sat on the edge of his bed, arms on his knees and hands suspended between them. He looked like he had that first time, perched on his makeshift cot in the storeroom, only now his fingers fiddled nervously with only air. His hair was swept behind his ears, lower lip worried between his teeth.

Offering the tray, Rey said, “Sorry I’m a little late. Hopefully I didn’t keep you waiting too long.”

He shook his head, accepting the meal tray – only to bend over, placing it on the ground.

Chin tilting up, his wide eyes found her, dry and almost as enflamed as she’d first seen them. He’d apparently stopped using the creams. "Can you show me the, what did you call it, the haze? On the memories?" His voice rasped slightly, disused and soft.

Rey swallowed thickly. "I'll have to go back in your head."

"I know."

He patted the bed next to him as she had done, and the reminder had her chest tightening. Still her feet somehow found the energy to move, and she fell heavily onto the bed cover. Thigh to thigh, hip to hip. Her hand slowly rose to lie against his cheek, touch light and fingertips just brushing his hairline. Her thoughts flitted to how she’d spent an hour or more cupping his face, holding the gauze to his nose, hand tangled half in his hair to apply pressure. The bruises looked a little better, having slowly faded in snapshots glimpsed through the half-open door.

She unglued her tongue from the roof of her mouth. “Ready?”

He closed his eyes, his answer the barest parting of lips. “Yes.”

As respectfully as possible, she crept into his mind. While not quite familiar, it felt less alien, less agitated than the interrogation had left him last time. Steadying herself, she caught her bearings, trying to remember how far she’d jumped back before.

Pinging from memory to memory, she pushed into the past.

_A throng of upturned indifferent faces staring at a man on a podium. He is led past them, arm gripped by a grey masked individual, the death gang ship in the hangar._

Real. She pushed further back, noting the differences between the death gang memories and these. These were through his eyes, his _real_ eyes, the colors less saturated and easily distinguished than with the implants.

_Sandstone under his knees. He keeps his gaze on the floor, a fist collides with the back of his head, his face when he looks up. Traces the cracks. The floating of dust kicked up by the bare feet passing._

Real. Rey leapt further back.

_The slavers easily storm the complex, guards having not been thought necessary. They force him to his knees, he sees the handle of a blaster lifting, falling –_

False. Freezing the memory, she let the glow suffuse around them, seeping into the spaces when his mind pried too sharply at the details. He trembled next to her, both mentally and physically.

She inched forward, searching for the first real moment.

_It's him on the floor of an unfamiliar ship, eyes snapping open, head pounding mercilessly behind his temple. Tangled in limbs, the press of other bodies against his sides, over his back. Crushing. It’s amazing he can breathe. Arm extended over his head, there’s a white plastic band on the floor near his wrist, ripped savagely . His fingers twitch towards it, push it into a position he can read the writing. Thomas Ardellian. Yes. Thomas. That was right. It was coming back to him. Tangled in other bodies, most alive and trying not to be, some dead. A dead man stares back at him an inch from his face. He tries to shove him away with the arm pinned to his chest. Can't. Closes the eyes with a brush of his hand._

She extracted herself from the memory and hovered there in his head, her eyes closed. Communication wasn’t limited to words with their minds entwined and fluttering against each other, exchanging pure feeling and image and thought. She felt it, processed it in one stream, the inefficient middle-man of language unnecessary.

 _Repulsed_ – that she observed the markets, the transport ship. _Grateful_ , _thankful_ to share it with someone he trusted. _Her_. The desperate desire to share everything with someone for so long, _he’s been alone, been lonely, for so long_. Her own loneliness answered the call, crawling from the hole she’d buried it in and creeping to the forefront. He welcomed it, brushed against it, him soothing _her_.

_He wants to comfort her. Knows that he – Hux? Not Hux not Hux – hurt people. He won’t hurt her._

_He wants to hold her hand, when she was showing him Jakku_ , _when she sits so close to him_. _Does she hate him. Would she hate him if he pressed his cheek to her knee when she sat at his side, would she hate him if –_

In the real world, the bed shifted ever so slightly. Fear fluttering in his mind, leaking into hers, no barriers between them. Hope and desperation sing the strongest, scorching and hot and sick and giddy.

He pressed his lips against hers.

Soft warmth, lips closed. Pleasure hummed, in him, in her. _This is my first_.

Rey didn’t know who had thought it. Perhaps they both had.

He was the one to pull away as she slipped out of his head. Her mouth parted, eyes cracking open.

Thankful he could no longer hear her thoughts, Rey only knew one thing.

She was fucked. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come talk to me at [Link somethingstately](http://somethingstately.tumblr.com/)!


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A kiss draws a line in the sand. Bit of a transitional chapter, with some big stuff to follow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it has taken me forever to post this. But I have not given up on this story, and I have the rest sketched out. Thank you to everyone who has read, kudos'ed, and commented! 
> 
> Come talk to me at [ somethingstately](http://somethingstately.tumblr.com/)

For the life of her, Rey could barely remember what it was that they did after.

Emboldened by her acceptance, plain and unmistakable as it had been through the overlap of their minds, Hux had folded himself into her side. Warm fingers entwined with her own, her jaw tickled by messed red strands as his head found the pocket formed between her neck and shoulder. Words had escaped her, mind almost unable to process what had just occurred. It ricocheted between the heady afterglow of sharing such a moment while linked to appraising the seemingly yawning chasm opening up beneath her feet. If she listened intently enough, it was like she could almost make out the swish of a page, the soft click of a door separating the tepid glow of an uncertain future from the steady ground of the past behind them.

She’d become compromised. No, Rey figured almost dazedly, she’d waved at _compromised_ as she sped full-tilt past it, hurtling into territory she’d never expected to encounter. She’d kissed General Hux. It didn’t matter if that wasn’t so true anymore, it would be the only truth the world would care to see.

What would she say to Leia? _Ah, yes, General , well you see, it’s when he looks at me like I’m the world itself –_

That would go over well. And what in the ever spinning name of all that was Holy would she say to Finn – _could_ she say to Finn?

Nothing, as it turned out. Rather than burning at the edge of her tongue like she’d expected, the truth only seemed to burrow further into her whenever he was around. It was having a hidden wreck, a treasure trove, all to herself, and for a woman accustomed to keeping secrets because she had no one to share them with, the words wouldn’t have come even if she’d wanted them to.

Hux, for his part, hadn’t pushed it, hadn’t given more than the single kiss that still tingled on her lips. Tingled for hours after, days after, the sensation a stone sinking into the mud of memory –

Until, of course, another took its place.

And another. And another.

Feeling things out as they were, by some unspoken agreement it never seemed to go any farther than that. Sweet kisses and the press of his thumb to her knuckles, the slow, easy sweep of a long finger. Taken together her mind parted as easily as butter, heart thrumming loudly within her own ears until she felt like a fire had been set somewhere underneath her, low and bellowed by the soft puff of his breath against her lips. But it was nothing compared to the excitement, nervous and half-trembling with the fear of rejection, she felt with each brush against his mind.

He laid himself bare with her. Tilted his chin and offered his throat each time they kissed, trusting her not to hurt him.

Promising himself he could never hurt her.

After all the time she’d spent with him, Rey had found that there were few things more addictive in life than being wanted, being needed. Being trusted. Years alone had hollowed out a cavity in her chest she hadn’t thought capable of being filled. Now she drew as much of himself into her as she could, soaking in his trust and desire and always finding room for more.  Rey had only just become accustomed to friendship, to knowing unequivocally that someone was there at her back.  But this… this well she could draw long and deep and somehow never find her thirst quenched.

It reminded her of Jakku. Hopeless. Mad.

And yet, so simple.

When he blinked shyly up at her over the lip of a holopad, lying on his back with his shoulder against her hip – she’d catch the sun’s rays glinting off a half-buried hull in the sand, so full of promise. She’d bend her neck and part her lips, almost without thinking, and the wet, soft touch of his tongue across her own would coax a choked groan from her throat –

And she’d drink.

And drink.

Some days, a week maybe, if she’d kept track, passed when she found herself padding behind him, gaze fixed on the singular bright white swathe of skin revealed by his hair, pulled to one side of his neck. Gaze sunk downwards, he hadn’t noticed her approach on Force-light feet. Creeping behind him, about to sweep her fingers through the delicate strands dusting his shoulders, she stopped, caught by the half-screen peeking from over his shoulder.

The photo of Hux, the same one from his Academy days, fixed its hard, cruel stare back at her.

His fingers played with a lock of his hair, red splashing over his fingers like something she’d prefer not to dwell on. Looked first at his hair, then down. Then back.

Rey retreated without saying a word.

A day later, the image clung to the underside of her thoughts, needling away.

Picking at the hanging edge of a nail, ripped during sparring with the droid, she carefully kept her gaze away from his. “Did you think, that is,” she took a breath, “did you want to cut your hair?”

A hitch of his breath drew her eyes upward anyway, taking in the high points of color on his cheeks. “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” he whispered.

“Just wondering,” she managed, finding her tongue almost sluggish to move. She’d figured.  

"Rey?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm not him."

She swallowed. Smiled for his sake, if not her own. "I know."

And she did.

She knew it every time their lips met, every time her hand ached to trace across his cheek and the voices in her mind shuddered to life once again. It ached – this wanting, this knowing.

And it ached that the base was so hostile, not to her exactly, but she could feel it every time she walked its corridors, the whispers tingling like a breeze at the hairs of the back of her neck. A wariness she hadn’t felt before this started. It would have been wonderful if she could have had both – her private life, the warm kisses in the half-dark, and the friends and respect on which she’d come to rely. Her time with him bore the dreamworld quality of her AT-AT, a small space removed from the scorching sun and wind and grit.

He seemed to sense the sadness, kept his head down when they went out, which wasn’t often. Clinging to her wake, he shadowed her steps, at first behind her, then ever closer, at her shoulder.

Until one late night, after she’d spun and parried and danced with the brute of the droid and he’d watched uneasily on, he took her hand.

She didn’t let go.  

 

\-------

 

Above ground, it would have been dark.

Below ground wasn’t much better.

She considered herself a woman of action, a woman of words – quick-thinking _ratatat_ sniped off from a barb pointed tongue, a persuasively levelled blaster. Introspection wasn’t something she dabbled in much; normally she left that kind of thing to people who could do it better, people like Luke. Every so often it snuck up on her though, grabbing her by the shoulders and sinking her bodily into the embrace of the nearest chair.

This was the sort of introspection that called for an expansive viewport, the chilling blackness of space an infinite canvas for the brush strokes of dark, still thoughts. It was the sort of moment that was long and twisting, winding its way through the seconds like a tentacle in the deep. A tumbler of something bitter and strong would have been right at home by her hand, the high curve of a heavy chair silhouetted against her shoulders.

Funny how things worked out.

She didn’t have a viewport. Didn’t have the disquieting remoteness of the void or a stately chair to lend gravitas to her thoughts. And the closest thing she’d seen to bitter and strong in some long years were the pilots who tread her corridors every day.

No, Leia had a wall, a shoddy partition separating her from the rest of central command in the underground bunker complex they called home, and a glass of lukewarm water she’d forgotten from earlier. It figured really. Quiet in the wee hours, the muffled movements of a skeleton crew were just barely audible.

Not-shapes skittered and swirled if she stared at the wall hard enough. Figments of a brain that had torn through exhaustion and out the other side again, where even heading to her silent quarters to fall into what might have been sleep seemed like too much effort. Besides, she had a feeling the bed wouldn’t do her any good. There was an emptiness wholly unlike anything else; the emptiness of a bed that would never be full, truly full, again.

For months, she’d sought out Han. An old suspicion, a hope maybe, that his posturing and smooth-talking claims of luck were really Force sensitivity, long buried. And so she’d searched, and waited, and searched and waited. Pushing her awareness outward farther, ever farther, until her mouth ran dry and her eyes pricked.

She couldn’t feel him.

A small part of her, the part that could still see the slightly abashed, doubly offended look he wore when he was wrong, cradled the hope that if he _did_ find out he was a ghostly manifestation of a creed he long-denied – he’d be too proud to show up.  Or if it wasn’t hope, because that would require denying the truth, it was the tiny pinprick of a candle in the long, cold dark ahead of her. 

Times like these, she needed all the light she could get.

Maker knew there was so little of it left in herself.

Squeezing her eyes shut, Leia reached for her holopad. The weight was familiar in her hands, palm slotting against the smooth edge just so. A thousand orders of business flitted across the projection volume, directed by the sharp motions of a thumb. They blended together to eyes too long deprived of sleep, letters leaking meaning in their slip into mere shapes.

Until one in particular caught her eye. Calling it up specifically, she sped through the short update.

_Subjects seen entering and exiting training areas together. Otherwise unremarkable. Subjects seem in good spirits._

A snort escaped her. She’d informed her aide, Nathaniel, that such formality wasn’t required, but he never could seem to shake his love for theatrics. Thumb moving to dismiss the message, her eyes almost missed the last sentence.

_Brief holding of hands in south central corridor._

Leia let out a breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding.

The passing weeks had begun to erode her confidence in the wisdom of her actions, each day without a sign calling into question whether or not what she hoped for was possible.

But here, Maker forgive her, here was a sign. It almost made it all worth it.

When she’d placed Rey in charge of escorting him to medbay, guessing all too easily from the hunch and mottled bruising what she’d see, it had been to open the door. When she’d purposefully distanced herself, it had seemed cruel, needlessly so – depriving the young woman of a sense of order, of support, precisely when Finn, stewing in righteous anger, would be least likely to provide it. But it had been done with the best of intentions, as it all was, and the prayer that it would drive her closer to the shivering wreck of a boy that maybe, if she squinted, Leia could envision as the General who fired on the Hosnian System. To step within fifteen feet of him was to know how badly that boy longed for a gentle word, a kind gesture – Rey needed only a nudge in his direction, a wall put up in a maze to block off the wrong turn. 

And when Leia had leaked to the base their prisoner’s true identity, it was to close off every path but the one Rey needed to go.

_Brief holding of hands in south central corridor._

Leia could have smiled. If she could even remember how.

It didn’t absolve her – nothing ever did, nor ever would, and she wore those black marks of necessary decisions on her innermost self so that others wouldn’t have to. But if she could save a soul, save _two_ if need be in the bargain, it would be worth it. Leia needed to deepen the ties Hux felt to the Resistance, cultivate his gratitude and trust in the one who had saved him, if this plan was to have any chance of working.  

She wondered if anyone had ever given Hux a chance to leave, break with the twisted worldview the Remnants had created for themselves. Clean slate. Open hand.

Like her son was offered.

Her heart seized, the old, scratched out memories and sudden void of a life winking out clawing at her throat. He wouldn’t leave, not before, but maybe with some leverage, he would. Hux and he, they were close – romantically, if it was to be believed, and knowing the capacity of her son’s heart Leia certainly did.

After Hux had been brought to his holding chamber, after the viewing party had dispersed, she’d sat, long and still and quiet, in front of a console. She’d composed the message a hundred times, a thousand times, the words rewriting themselves before she’d scarce even finished arranging them. At last she’d decided on the truth. Rey’s words, shaky and yet never more strong.

_He’s not lying. If this was General Hux, he isn't any more._

Leia had sent the message. And with it, the chance to bring her son back.

A part of her couldn’t believe she even wanted to.

Her thoughts flashed to Hux, tears tracking down gaunt cheeks and sharp cries barely blocked by the wall of glass that had initially separated them. Such a far cry from the hard-eyed man that served as her counterpart, words sharp and clipped and perfectly chosen in the one broadcast she’d seen. All that cold fire, melting so naturally into dogging Rey’s every step, clinging to every scrap of affection she provided him. How easily he had been neutralized.

A thought crept into the back of her mind, guiltily playing with hopes she’d long since buried. How easy might it be to wipe Ben’s mind? It probably wasn’t in her wheelhouse, no matter her affinity for mental persuasion. Too little training and too much emotional conflict, both of them her fault if she wanted to be honest.

But Luke, perhaps Luke could…?

She cut off the thought. It was too tempting, and she didn’t trust herself enough with it.

Someone else, and Leia had a feeling she knew who even if not quite the why, had made the choice for Hux. But Ben would have to make his own. It had trickled through her grapevine to reach her ears a year ago that he was putting in inquiries, and it had recently come through that her message had him slowly working his way up the pipeline they’d pieced together from Hux’s memories. The convenient murder of Hux’s very slaver scarce a day after her son’s visit was not exactly the subtlety she’d tried and failed to instill in him as a boy. If he was half as smart as she knew he was, he would already be looking for them.

Leia called up a private comm. Encrypted, twice scrambled, text only.

Surely this was madness. This was showing her hand, revealing her ace, red-rimmed and shaking and tucked high in the recesses of her sleeve. Either the plan would work, which she couldn’t dare yet let herself believe, or it would backfire massively, and she risked losing not only the ace, but many of the cards in the deck. Still, it was the only shot she’d get, and worry wouldn’t bend the odds any more in her favor.

The corner of her mouth lilted upwards. _Never tell me the odds_.

She typed out her message and prayed.

 

\--------

 

The _ping_ was unmistakable, lancing through the quiet of his bedroom, darkened for sleep.

Kylo opened his eyes. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come talk to me at [ somethingstately](http://somethingstately.tumblr.com/)


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